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'  acquaintance  ~  with  Mr. 
Riley  began  by  correspond 
ence.  I  began  it.  A  ridiculously 
young  editor,  with  soaring  ambitions 
and  the  least  money  imaginable,  I 
was  gravely  trying  to  conduct  the 
literary  departments  of  a  Chicago 
weekly.  I  had  a  yearly  allowance 
for  my  editorial  purchases,  and  so 
long  as  I  kept  within  that  sum  I 
was  permitted  to  have  whatever  my 
eighteen-year-old  tastes  dictated  and 
my  purse  would  buy. 

I  decided  to  have  a  Riley  poem. 
To  this  end  I  skimped  and  saved 
until  I  had  amassed  the  staggering 
sum  of  [twenty-five  dollars,  which, 
without  any  preliminary  negotia 
tions,  I  sent  to  Mr.  Riley  with  a 
7 

3579oo 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

polite  note  requesting  twenty-five 
dollars  worth  of  his  very  best  poetry. 
I  had  no  idea  of  the  temerity  of 
my  request.  That  twenty-five-dol 
lar  check  looked  big  enough  to  me 
to  buy  "In  Memoriam"  or  "Para 
dise  Lost." 

I  got  the  poem.  How  many  hun 
dreds  of  dollars  many  another  editor 
would  gladly  have  paid  for  that 
poem  I  am  now  ashamed  to  think. 
But  I  wasn't  ashamed  then.  I 
didn't  know  enough. 

I  was  appreciative,  though;  and 
while  Mr.  Biley  was  no  stranger 
to  appreciation,  he  doubtless  liked 
it  as  well  as  we  all  do.  So,  what 
with  the  passing  back  and  forth 
of  proof  (Mr.  Biley  was  a  most 
punctilious  reader  of  proof)  and 
grateful  acknowledgments,  and  so 
on,  our  correspondence  began. 

In  June  following  that  Christmas 
when  I  proudly  presented  my  readers 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

with  a  Riley  poem  filling  an  entire 
page,  there  came  to  me  from  the 
poet  an  urgent  invitation  to  go 
down  to  Winona  Lake,  Indiana,  to 
attend  the  annual  sessions  of  the 
Western  Writers'  Association. 

Who  started  this  society  I  do 
not  know,  nor  have  I  any  idea  if 
it  is  still  in  existence.  But  if  it 
continues,  it  must  be  so  different 
from  the  Association  I  knew,  that 
I  may,  perhaps,  be  pardoned  for 
writing  of  it  in  the  past  tense.  It 
had  its  genesis  in  a  day  before  the 
Indiana  School  of  fiction  was  famed; 
in  a  day  when  editors  and  publishers 
had  not  yet  begun  to  court  the 
Middle  West;  when  many  persons 
who  ought  doubtless  to  have  known 
better,  still  felt  they  must  have  their 
heroes  tailored  on  Broadway,  their 
heroines  costumed  on  Fifth  Avenue, 
and  who  tuned  their  very  lyres  to 
sing  about  New  England's  coast. 
9 


REMINISCENCES   OF 

The  readiness  and  heartiness  with 
which  James  Whitcomb  Biley  would 
respond  to  an  invitation  from  per 
sons  wishing  to  associate  with  West 
ern  writers  can  be  imagined.  No  one 
needs  to  be  told  how  earnest  he 
was  in  his  belief  that  literature 
should  be  indigenous;  that  it  should 
chronicle  and  illumine  the  things 
its  writers  knew  best.  He  was,  to 
quote  his  own  words,  "the  first 
of  ten  or  fifteen  vice-presidents"  of 
the  Association.  He  not  only  at 
tended  its  sessions,  but  he  brought 
to  them  a  great  many  persons  of 
distinguished  literary  achievement, 
who  met  the  members  and  addressed 
them  from  the  platform  and  who 
served  still  another  purpose:  they 
gave  Mr.  Eiley  fellowship  and  some 
brief  respites  from  the  palpitating 
poets  and  poetesses,  who  lurked 
in  every  clump  of  shrubbery  to 
waylay  him  and  read  to  him,  as 
10 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

he  ruefully  said,  "peach-baskets  full 
o'  poetry."  Every  muse  of  the 
corn-belt  carried  the  year's  product 
to  Winona,  and  each  one  hoped  to 
read  the  whole  output  to  Mr.  Riley. 
I  am  afraid  that  of  the  persons 
who  were  seriously  working  in  a 
way  to  bring  honor  to  Western 
writers,  very  few  went  to  those 
sessions  at  Winona  Lake  unless  Mr. 
Riley  energetically  rounded  them 
up  and  drove  them  there.  And 
most  of  the  voluntary  attendants 
were  rather  pathetic.  But  Mr.  Riley 
was  marvellously  patient  and  kind. 
And  I  think  I  understand  now,  as 
I  did  not  then,  how  he  felt  about 
those  plaintive  pipings;  how  he 
valued  them,  not  for  what  they 
were  about  to  confer  on  a  waiting 
world,  but  for  what  he  knew  it 
meant  to  those  various  persons  to 
sing  or  to  create  unrestricted  worlds 
of  fancy  and  desire. 
11 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

Ijwent  to  Winona  Lake,  which  is 
some  three  and  a  half  hours'  ride 
from  Chicago;  my  train  reached 
there  about  6 :30,  when  nearly  every 
body  was  at  supper.  Mr.  Riley 
was  at  the  little  railway  station, 
and  he  seemed  to  be  looking  for 
someone;  but  that  it  could  be  for 
me  did  not  occur  to  me.  I  was 
hot  and  grimy,  and  Mr.  Frank 
Marshall,  a  friend  whom  I  had  met 
on  the  train,  had  warned  me  to 
hurry  if  I  wanted  any  supper.  So 
I  did  not  discover  myself  to  the 
poet,  but  made  all  haste  to  the 
hotel. 

After  a  quick  wash  and  freshening 
up,  I  went  down  to  supper,  to  join 
me  at  which  Mr.  Marshall  had 
very  kindly  waited.  When  we 
passed  the  desk  in  the  office,  Mr. 
Riley  was  scanning  the  register. 

Mr.  Marshall  and  I  had  the 
dining-room  to  ourselves,  and  our 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

seats  were  more  than  half-way  down 
the  long  room,  facing  the  door. 
Shortly  after  we  had  begun  to  eat 
our  supper,  I  saw  Mr.  Riley  come 
to  the  door  and  look  in.  Presently 
a  bell-boy  came  and  whispered  some 
thing  in  Mr.  Marshall's  ear.  The 
answer  was,  "Yes,  it  is";  and  a 
minute  later  Mr.  Riley  was  walking 
down  the  long  center  aisle  of  the 
dining-room,  his  face  lighted  with 
the  peculiarly  winning  expression  I 
came  to  know  so  well  as  the  pre 
cursor  of  his  quaint  drolleries — the 
expression  Sargent  has  immortalized 
in  his  portrait  of  Riley. 

Not  a  word  did  the  poet  say  to 
me  by  way  of  introduction:  just 
looked  at  me  with  eyes  that  were 
dancing  with  whimsical  humor; 
then,  in  that  drawl  of  his  which  can 
never  be  described,  much  less  repro 
duced  on  paper,  he  demanded: 
"Where  are  your  corkscrew  curls?" 
13 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

There  had  been  nothing  in  those 
solemn  letters  of  mine  to  prepare 
him  for  the  chit  of  a  thing  who 
answered  to  my  name;  and  the 
disparity  between  his  preconception 
of  me  and  the  individual  I  turned 
out  to  be  amused  him  more  than 
a  little.  His  mental  picture  of  me 
had  been  that  of  a  very  spinsterly 
middle-aged  Presbyterian  person, 
whose  lack  of  acquaintance  with 
the  world  was  pathetically  evident — 
just  the  one  to  revel  in  those  peach- 
baskets  full  of  poetry!  He  ad 
mitted  that  his  disappointment  was 
acute.  But  he  made  the  best  of 
it  and  did  not  allow  me  to  feel  too 
chagrined. 

There  were  programs  every  day, 
several  of  them — morning,  after 
noon,  and  evening — all  designed  to 
be  very  improving  to  persons  who 
did  not  care  who  made  the  nation's 
laws  but  sought  for  themselves  the 
14 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

higher  responsibility  of  making  the 
nation's  songs.  Sometimes  we 
attended  these;  but  I  am  afraid 
that  oftener  we  played  hookey. 

Mr.  Riley's  respect  for  the  ear 
nestness  displayed  in  those  programs 
was  genuine  and,  in  a  way,  profound. 
But  also  he  could  not  help  knowing 
how  funny  they  were.  I  recall  one 
young  school  teacher  from  a  small 
Indiana  town  who  had  either  been 
assigned  or  had  chosen  for  her 
theme,  "French  Novels";  which, 
ever  was  true,  it  was  more  incred 
ible  than  the  other  could  have  been. 
It  was  a  season  of  organdies,  and 
this  nice  girl,  who  was  Irish,  and 
as  modest  as  perhaps  only  a  sweet 
Irish  maid  can  be,  was  a-flutter 
with  pale-blue  organdie,  ruffled  and 
ribboned  in  the  very  best  style  of 
the  local  modiste.  She  was  scared, 
too — not  only  because  it  was  an 
awesome  thing  to  be  reading  a 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

paper  before  the  Western  Writers' 
Association,  but  because  the  sub 
ject  was  so  risqub.  She  began  by 
saying,  earnestly,  that  she  hoped  no 
one  present  would  think  she  had 
ever  read  any  French  novels.  And 
then  she  told  us  all  about  them 
that  a  nice  girl  could  impart  to 
her  literary  confreres. 

Another  speaker  who  gave  us 
great  delight  was  a  very  tall,  very 
slender^very  superior  youth,  whom 
we  called  "the  Kipling  stripling." 
He  had  just  discovered  "Barrack 
Room  Ballads,"  and  he  told  about 
them  with  an  air  Columbus  might 
have  worn  but  probably  did  not 
when  telling  Queen  Isabella  what 
he  had  found  overseas.  Mr.  Riley 
made  some  delicious  pencil  sketches 
of  this  missioner,  which  I  ought 
to  have  in  some  dust-laden  box  or 
other. 

I  don't  mean  to  affirm  that  all 
16 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

the  papers  were  as  funny  as  these, 
nor  to  deny  that  we  should  not 
have  liked  them  better  if  they  had 
been.  Most  of  them  were  as  deadly 
dull  as  "papers"  usually  are.  So, 
as  unostentatiously  as  possible,  we 
sat  down  by  the  lake's  reedy  marge 
and  talked  of  shoes  and  ships  and 
sealing-wax,  or  cabbages  and  kings, 
or  went  on  truant  trips  to  Warsaw, 
two  miles  or  so  away,  a  gay  metrop 
olis  where  one  could  purchase  exe 
crable  soda  water  and  much  worse 
candy,  and  lead  a  lurid  life  far 
from  the  culture-craving  crowd. 

Once,  at  Warsaw,  milder  amuse 
ments  having  palled,  we  sought  a 
secluded  spot — I  think  it  was  on 
the  court-house  lawn — and  indulged 
in  a  game  of  mumbledy-peg,  whereat 
the  poet  was  amazing  proficient. 
He  was  executing  some  breath-taking 
stunt  in  this  and  doing  it  with  a 
gusto  that  "Buddy"  Riley  could 
17 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

never  have  outmatched  in  his  best 
Greenfield  days,  when  he  was  rec 
ognized  by  a  Warsaw  admirer. 
Well!  As  for  me,  I  couldn't  see  that 
the  admirer  was  to  be  pitied  that 
glimpse,  probably  his  only  one,  of 
the  author  of  "Little  Orphant 
Annie"  and  "The  Raggedy  Man." 
But  Mr.  Riley  seemed  to  think  it 
left  something  to  be  desired  in  the 
manner  of  meeting  a  poet.  "May 
never  meet  another,  you  know," 
he  complained  comically,  "and  it's 
likely  to  color  all  his  ideas  of  poets. 
Too  bad!"  I  think  we  bought  a 
watermelon  to  revive  our  drooping 
self-respect.  But  I  remember  that 
it  used  to  be  no  small  problem  to 
sit  by  the  side  of  a  road  and  eat  a 
watermelon  with  dignity.  And  just 
as  surely  as  we  dispensed  with  the 
dignity,  out  of  an  adjacent  corn 
stalk  or  hollow  stump  would  rise 
as  by  magic  some  one  saying: 
18 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

"Oh!    there's  James    Whitcomb 
Riley!" 

He  was  one  of  the  very  few  literary 
persons  this  country  has  produced 
who  was  almost  universally  rec 
ognized  when  he  walked  abroad. 
I  am  not  sure  that  even  Mark 
Twain  was  so  generally  known — at 
least  not  before  he  began  wearing 
white  suits.  Most  writers  come  and 
go  unnoticed  by  their  fellowmen, 
unless  they,  if  they  are  male,  hap 
pen  to  resemble  a  popular  prize 
fighter  or,  if  they  are  female,  a 
favorite  actress.  But  Riley Vas  sure 
to  be  known  and  acclaimed,  any 
where  he  went.  And  while  he  appre 
ciated  the  interest  people  had  in 
him,  he  was  not  inconsiderably  irked 
by  it,  ofttimes.  As,  for  instance, 
when  I  went  with  him  once  into  a 
"gents'  furnishing  store,"  in  a  small 
Indiana  town,  the  proprietor  de 
lightedly  recognized  his  customer. 
19  / 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

"The  las'  time  I  see  Mr.  Riley," 
he  confided  to  me,  "was  when  he 
was  a  right  young  fella.  He  painted 
me  a  sign.  I  got  it  yet — wouldn't 
take  any  money  fer  it.  Like  to 
see  it?" 

I  had  heard  a  great  deal  about 
that  phase  of  Mr.  Riley's  youth 
when  he  ran  away  from  home  and 
the  study  of  law,  and  supported 
himself  in  his  errantry  by  painting 
store-signs.  So  I  thanked  the 
"gents'  furnisher"  and  said  I  should 
be  glad  indeed  to  see  his  treasure. 

He  produced  it:  an  odd  little 
specimen  of  fancy  lettering,  in  bright 
blue. 

"I  'member,"  the  proud  possessor 
said,  "like  it  was  yesterday,  the 
day  that  sign  was  painted.  Mr. 
Riley  wore  kid  gloves  while  he 

•       i  •      9    •§.    )9 

was  paintm  it. 

At  this  point  Mr.  Riley  vanished. 
When  I  rejoined  him,  half  a  block 
20 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

away,  he  was  fuming  and  fulminating 
in  his  own  peculiar,  picturesque 
style. 

"The  large,  gentlemanly  pearl- 
gray  ass!"  he  cried.  "He  dreamed 
that  fantasy  on  some  dark,  moon 
less  night,  and  he  has  told  it  so 
many  times  that  he  has  made 
himself  believe  it.  Why,  a  man 
couldn't  paint  with  kid  gloves  on!" 

I  remember  asking  for  illumination 
about  the  pearl-gray  variety  of  ass. 

"Don't  know  much  about  asses, 
do  you?"  he  replied. 

I  admitted  that  I  didn't. 

"Well,"  he  said,  "a  pearl-gray  ass 
is  one  that  has  been  an  ass  a  long, 
long  time." 

He  had  a  multitude  of  such  ex 
pressions.  I  recollect  his  saying  a 
man  had  "hard-boiled  eyes,"  and 
describing  a  certain  woman's  mouth 
as  "like  a  stab  in  the  dark." 


REMINISCENCES  OF 


n 


June  days  at  Winona  Lake 
were  pleasant;  but  the  even 
ings  were  memorable  indeed. 

There  was  a  small  "ordinary"  off 
the  main  dining-room,  and  there  we 
were  wont  to  gather  —  four,  six,  in 
frequently  more  of  us  —  and  banquet 
splendidly  on  crackers  and  cheese, 
pickles,  sweet  chocolate,  and  cold 
tea.  I  have  sat  at  many  a  table, 
since,  with  the  keenest  and  most 
charming  personages  of  my  day; 
but  I  have  never  heard  talk  so  fas 
cinating. 

Mr.  Riley  was  always  the  dom 
inating  spirit,  his  mood  the  key 
in  which  our  pleasure  was  pitched. 
His  sensibility  to"  the  moods  of 
others  was,  at  times  like  those, 
extraordinary;  he  seemed  to  know 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

infallibly  when  everybody  was  in 
time  and  tune,  and  when  some  one 
was  ever  so  little  off  key.  In  the 
latter  event  he  would  keep  the  con 
versation  within  the  safe  bounds  of 
jocularity.  He  had  to  feel  perfectly 
assured  before  he  would  venture 
upon  any  seriousness. 

There  was  one  evening  when  we 
were  but  four  at  table:  Mr.  Riley, 
Mr.  Frank  L.  Stanton,  the  Atlanta 
poet,  Mrs.  Whipple — a  little  lady 
into  whose  chaperonage  Mr.  Riley 
had  consigned  me  immediately  upon 
his  discovery  of  my  disconcert 
ing  youth — and  I.  Mr.  Stanton's 
mind  is  an  inexhaustible  store-house 
of  great  poetry,  which  he  recites 
beautifully.  Out  under  the  trees 
that  silvery  June  night,  he  had  re 
peated,  on  Mr.  Riley 's  continued 
urging,  poem  after  poem.  His  mem 
ory  is  particularly  rich  in  Shake 
speare;  and,  bit  by  bit  as  the  talk 
23 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

ran  on,  he  illumined  it  with  snatches 
of  this  immortal  scene  and  of  that. 

Just  how  the  talk  proceeded  from 
Shakespeare  to  Mrs.  Browning,  I 
do  not  recall,  but  it  was  an  easy 
progress.  Mr.  Riley  considered 
Mrs.  Browning's  mind  the  most 
exquisite  that  had  expressed  itself 
in  poetry  since  Shakespeare.  At 
any  rate,  we  were  talking  of  her 
when  we  went  indoors;  and  I,  who 
had  my  thumbed  and  much-marked 
copy  of  her  poems  with  me,  went 
to  my  room  and  fetched  it. 

We^had  our  bite  to  eat,  still 
talking  of  her,  and  there  came  up 
the  old,  old  subject  of  how  much 
an  artist  must  have  lived  and  suf 
fered  in  order  to  express  himself 
with  passion  and  authority.  Mr. 
Riley  said  it  was  a  matter  not  of 
extensity  but  of  intensity:  that  in 
going  to  the  depths  of  one  great 
human  emotion  one  reaches  a  point 
24 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

of  sympathetic  understanding  where 
all  profound  emotions  become  com 
prehensible. 

In  illustration  of  this  he  began  to 
read  from  my  copy  of  Mrs.  Browning. 
First  he  read  "Bianca  Among  the 
Nightingales,"  and  oh,  how  he  read 
it!  His  was  truly  a  golden  voice, 
comparable  to  none  other  that  I 
have  ever  heard  in  man;  it  had 
extraordinary  flexibility  and  intense, 
quiet  passion. 

As  he  read  the  ravings  of  poor, 
jealousy-mad  Bianca,  there  was  such 
wildness  of  pain  in  his  tones  as 
made  us  who  listened  ache  with 
almost  unendurable  anguish.  Then 
he  read  "The  Runaway  Slave  at 
Pilgrim's  Point,"  and  our  tears 
flowed  unrestrained. 

"You  see?"   he  said.     "Having 

plumbed   the   deeps,   in   one   great 

emotional  experience,  that  little  bit 

of  a  bed-ridden  English  woman  was 

25 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

equally  capable  of  comprehending 
the  hot  jealousy  of  a  passionate 
Italian  girl  raving  for  her  faithless 
lover,  and  the  wild  agony  of  a  black 
mother  torn  from  her  child.  Yet 
she  had  never  even  seen  a  black 
woman.  Below  a  certain  depth 
all  suffering  is  sympathetic." 

On  another  night,  Hector  Fuller 
was  a  member  of  our  little  group. 
He  was  at  that  time  literary  and 
dramatic  critic  of  the  Indianapolis 
News,  and  Mr.  Kiley  found  much 
pleasure  in  his  companionship.  An 
Englishman  by  birth  and  a  cos 
mopolite  by  experience,  Mr.  Fuller 
has  a  rich  emotional  nature,  a 
broad  and  deep  acquaintance  with 
life  and  with  letters.  It  was  one 
of  the  absurdities  of  editorial  par 
simony  that,  as  if  reviewing  all 
the  new  books  and  all  the  plays 
were  not  enough  work  for  any  one 
man,  or  any  two,  for  that  matter, 
26 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

Mr.  Fuller  must  needs  conduct  a 
column  of  questions  and  answers, 
wherein  superannuated  subscribers 
might  ask  a  multitude  of  futile 
questions  about  "A  says  So-and-So 
is  right.  B  insists  that  it  is  Thus- 
and-So.  Please  settle  dispute."  One 
of  Mr.  Eiley's  pastimes  was  to 
think  up  the  most  preposterous 
queries,  and  write  them  to  the 
News  in  a  feigned  hand;  or,  when 
in  company  with  Mr.  Fuller,  to 
sit  pondering  things  to  propound 
to  him.  As,  for  example,  with  face 
serious,  innocent,  questioning:  "Ful 
ler,  which  has  the  sanction  of  the 
best  literary  usage — them  molasses, 
or  those  molasses?"  And  so  on. 

Mr.  Riley  loved  to  "play  pretend" 
as  much  as  any  child  of  whom  he 
ever  wrote.  Something  so  struck 
his  fancy,  on  one  evening  when 
Mr.  Fuller  was  with  us,  as  to  make 
him  recognize  in  Fuller  an  erst- 
27 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

while  butler,  Tompkins,  who  had 
stolen  his  master's  good  clothes 
and  gone  masquerading  as  a  gentle 
man.  Without  a  second's  hesita 
tion,  Mr.  Fuller  pleaded  guilty  to 
being  indeed  Tompkins,  begged  for 
mercy,  and,  having  been  pardoned 
the  theft,  rose  from  his  seat  and 
resumed  "buttering." 

He  is  a  mime  of  rare  ability;  I 
do  not  know  whether  he  had,  at 
any  time  in  his  varied  career,  ex 
perience  on  the  stage;  but  he  has 
not  only  the  appearance  of  an  able 
histrion,  but  the  gifts  of  one.  His 
mien,  his  manner,  as  Tompkins, 
made  the  characterization  as  artistic, 
in  its  way,  as  Mr.  Gillette's  butler 
in  "The  Admirable  Crichton." 

Tompkins'  "gentleman"  (Mr.  Ri- 
ley)  was,  it  seemed,  the  Honorable 
E.  Harold  Ashby  of  Hightowers, 
Newby,  Scrapshire,  England;  and 
I  was  Lady  Glendower. 
28 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

Our  food,  elegantly  "butlered," 
was  of  the  same  Warsaw  grocery 
store,  paper-bag  variety;  but  the 
service  was  distinguished,  and  the 
occasion  had  an  air  of  exclusive 
English  aristocracy,  except  that,  in 
spite  of  our  heroic  efforts  at  aris 
tocratic  suppression,  we  were  far 
merrier  than  any  supper  party  of 
English  aristocrats  I  have  ever  known 
or  "heard  tell  of.'5  Tompkins  had 
lapses  of  dignity,  forgetful  moments 
when  he  joined  in  the  conversation. 
But  his  quick  resumption  of  the 
Tompkins  air,  on  the  Honorable 
Ashby's  incensed  reminder,  was  such 
clever  playing  that  I  am  afraid  some 
of  us  may  have  encouraged  him  to 
forget  his  place. 

I  find  a  letter  dated  several  years 
later,  which  begins: 

"DEAR  LADY  GLENDOWER: 

I    go    at    once    with   your    message    to 
Tompkins,  who,  I  learn,  has  taken  service 
29 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

with  some  titled  personage  on  the  staff 
of  one  of  our  daily  papers  here,  and  I 
hasten  to  assure  your  Excellency  that, 
even  though  a  serving  man,  Tompkins 
is  a  most  loyal  adherent  of  your  Ladyship's 
cause  wherever  cast,  and  I  have  the  honor 
to  forecast  your  faithful  servant's  continued 
fealty  to  any  claim  upon  his  services  that 
it  might  please  your  Ladyship,  through  me, 
to  designate  to  the  worthy  rascal." 

Mr.  John  Curtis,  secretary  of 
the  Bobbs-Merrill  Company,  Mr. 
Riley's  publishers,  was  very  often 
a  member  of  these  supper-table 
groups,  and  always  entered  with 
delightful  spirit  into  the  occasion, 
whether  grave  or  gay.  Mr.  Biley 
had  a  warm  affection  for  Mr.  Cur 
tis,  whom  he  nevertheless  teased 
with  rare  unction.  Another  friend 
of  the  poet,  who  came  to  Winona 
Lake  at  his  behest,  was  "Bob" 
Burdette.  I  do  not  remember  hav 
ing  seen  Mr.  Eiley  in  the  company 
of  any  other  man  who  more  perfectly 
30 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

evoked  the  personality  of  Riley  or 
more  richly  responded  to  it.  When 
they  were  together,  what  one  didn't 
think  of,  t'other  did. 

There  was  an  evening,  during  that 
first  visit  of  mine  to  Winona,  when 
our  supper  party  included  Mr.  Riley, 
Mr.  Burdette,  Mr.  Curtis,  Mr.  Wil 
liam  E.  English  of  Indianapolis, 
Mrs.  Whipple,  and  me.  Mr.  Riley's 
brother-in-law  and  sister,  Mr.  and 
Mrs.  Henry  Eitel,  may  have  been 
there,  and  the  poet's  other  sister, 
Mary  Riley  Payne.  I  am  not  sure. 
But  I  remember  the  menu,  perfectly. 
It  was :  cracknels,  leathery  American 
cheese,  German  sweet  chocolate,  a 
kind  of  sweet  pickled  cauliflower — 
out  of  a  barrel  in  the  Warsaw  gro 
cery — and  a  very  thin  lemonade, 
which  Mr.  Riley  made  and  for  which 
we  had  only  three  lemons.  But 
Mr.  English,  who  has  sat  at  many 
tables  where  the  nation's  cleverest 
31 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

talk  is   supposed   to   flow,   said  he 
had    never    heard,    anywhere,    the 
equal  of  the  table  talk  that  night. 
That  fall  Mr.  Riley  wrote  me: 

"  Mr.  Burdette  was  here  two  days  ago — 
from  here  went  to  Chicago,  where  he  was 
to  meet  Mr.  Curtis.  By  this  they've 
called  upon  you,  doubtless,  as  Mr.  B.  told 
me  he  meant  to  write  some  Christmas 
verse  for  you.  Wish  it  had  been  possible 
for  me  to  have  gone  with  the  lovely  man — 
then  I  know  you'd  'a*  saw  him.  Speakin' 
o'  language,  do  you  recall  the  inspired  blind 
wood-sawyer's  lines? — 

'  He  was  a  sawyer — blind  from  birth, 
Tho'  otherwise  without  a  flaw, — 

While  no  one  ever  saw  him  see, 
Many  have  seen  him  saw.' ' 


JAMES   WHITCOMB   RILEY 


III 

*flTN  the  winter  following  my  first 
•1  visit  to  Winona,  I  went  down 
to  Southern  Indiana  to  spend  a 
week-end  with  Mrs.  Whipple/who 
lives  in  Rockville,  near  Terre  Haute. 
On  Monday  morning  we  took  an 
early  train — oh,  a  very  early  train; 
at  six  o'clock,  or  thereabouts — for 
Indianapolis,  where  I  had  never 
been.  Mr.  Curtis  met  us  at  the 
depot  (Mr.  Riley  loathed  trains, 
depots,  and — as  he  would  have  said 
— "all  appurtenances  thereof")  and 
escorted  us  to  the  Denison  Hotel, 
where  he  left  us,  saying  that  he 
and  Mr.  Riley  would  call  at  one 
o'clock  to  take  us  to  luncheon. 

Mr.    Riley    was    very    proud    of 
Indianapolis.     He    loved    the  spirit 
that  characterized  it  in  those  days. 
33 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

He  revelled  in  its  homeliness  (I 
use  the  word  as  the  English  do,  and 
not  as  we  prostitute  it)  and  its 
standards  of  aristocracy  and  democ 
racy.  He  told  me,  rhapsodically, 
how  ex-Presidents  and  Viee-Pres- 
idents  of  ,  these  United  States, 
might  be  seen,  daily,  on  the  beau 
tiful,  broad,  superbly  shaded  resi 
dence  streets  of  Indianapolis,  jog 
ging  downtown  in  the  back-seat 
of  the  modest  family  surrey,  driven 
by  the  colored  man-of-all-work, 
and  bound  for  the  big  market  to 
select  chickens  and  fresh  vegetables, 
before  going  to  their  law  offices. 
He  told  me  how,  at  evening  gath 
erings  in  those  fine,  old-fashioned 
homes  where  the  best  of  everything 
was  cultivated  and  appreciated,  one 
might  meet  a  young  lady  who  had 
that  day  sold  one  something  over  a 
counter  downtown.  He  believed 
that  Indianapolis  was  a  city  where 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

gentleness  and  fineness  of  spirit, 
of  mind,  rated  one — not  money  in 
bank,  or  opulent  possessions.  I  am 
afraid  he  felt  some  changes  before 
he  died.  But  in  those  days,  at  any 
rate,  it  was  as  fine-flavored  a  com 
munity  as  one  could  wish  to  be  in. 

Mr.  Riley  expatiated  on  this,  as 
we  set  forth  from  the  Denison  that 
cold  winter  noonday,  to  go  to  lunch. 
I  was  interested,"  of  course;  but  I 
had  breakfasted  about  five,  and  I 
had  another  interest  which  was — 
I  may  as  well  confess — paramount 
just  then. 

After  we  had  walked  about  the 
snowy  streets  for  some  time,  we 
halted  and  Mr.  Riley  and  Mr.  Cur 
tis  debated  where  they  would  take 
us  to  lunch.  We  listened  politely, 
but  hoped  it  was  nearby.  Their 
argument  grew  spirited,  then  acri 
monious.  At  length  they  com 
promised  on  some  place,  and  we 
35 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

went  thither.  On  the  very  threshold 
their  disagreement  broke  out  afresh. 
We  assured  them  that  we  were  sure 
this  place  would  do.  But,  no!  Mr. 
Curtis  discovered  in  himself  an  un 
conquerable  aversion  to  it.  We  re 
sumed  our  quest.  But  the  next 
place  proved  to  be  one  where  Mr. 
Riley  had  been  cavalierly  treated, 
and  he  would  not  have  me  get  my 
first  impression  of  Indianapolis  there. 
I  wanted  to  tell  him  that  no  place 
which  contained  real  food  would 
impress  me  as  less  lovely  than  the 
very  courts  of  Heaven.  But  I  didn't. 
About  two  o'clock  we  halted  before 
a  tall  office-building.  The  gentle 
men,  who  by  that  time  were  scarcely 
on  speaking  terms  with  one  another, 
assured  us  that  the  Indianapolis 
Commercial  Club  had  its  quarters  on 
the  top  floor  of  this  building,  and 
that  the  club  owned  a  portrait  of 
Riley  which  I  might  like  to  see. 
36 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

I  have  never  been  less  eager  to  see 
any  portrait;  but  we  went  up  to 
the  Commercial  Club.  We  discussed 
the  portrait.  I  mean,  somebody  dis 
cussed  it;  I  am  sure  I  didn't. 

Finally,  Mr.  Riley  said:  "  Perhaps 
you're  hungry?" 

I  pleaded  guilty.  Thereupon  Mr. 
Curtis  disappeared,  to  see  if  we 
could  get  lunch  at  the  club.  He 
came  back  from  his  tour  of  inquiry 
and  reported  that  while  the  regular 
luncheon  was  over,  we  could  get 
a  cold  "snack."  By  that  time  I 
was  reconciled  to  anything  that  could 
even  optimistically  be  called  food. 
So  we  repaired  to  one  of  the  private 
dining-rooms — where  we  found  a  per 
fect  bower  of  American  Beauty  roses, 
and  a  luncheon  which  had  been 
ordered  days  before  and  included 
every  delicacy  in  and  out  of  season. 

We  sat  there  until  six  p.m.  I 
Cannot  definitely  recall  any  of  Mr. 
37 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

Jtiley's  table  talk  that  day.  But 
I  remember  that  two  colored  waiters 
were  in  attendance,  and  so  great 
was  their  delight  in  Mr.  Riley's 
stories  that  neither  of  them  was 
willing  to  leave  the  room  to  fetch 
a  new  course  from  the  kitchen,  an 
argument  which  promised  to  be 
come  at  any  moment  a  "scrap," 
ensuing  each  time  the  necessity 
arose. 

Afterwards  I  went  often  to  Indian 
apolis,  and  had  many  memorable 
times.  Usually  I  stayed  with  Mr. 
Riley's  elder  sister,  Mrs.  Eitel,  a 
rarely  lovely  woman  who  idolized 
her  brother  Jim  and  never  tired 
telling  me  stories  of  his  boyhood. 
We  made  several  excursions  to 
Greenfield,  the  little  town  twenty 
miles  or  so  from  Indianapolis  where 
the  poet  and  his  brothers  and  sisters 
were  born  and  grew  to  adult  years. 

To  visit  Greenfield  with  the 
38 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

Rileys  was  an  event  indeed.  We 
went  to  their  old  home,  which 
sits  back  from  the  National  Road 
along  which  the  picturesque  prairie 
schooners  used  to  pass  with  Em 
pire's  westering  star,  while  Buddy 
Riley  hung  on  the  gate  watching 
them  out  of  wondering  big  blue 
eyes.  We  saw  "Th5  Ole  Swimmin' 
Hole";  walked  "Up  and  Down 
Old  Brandy  wine";  called  upon  the 
apple-cheeked,  sweet-souled  old  gen 
tleman,  Captain  Lee  O.  Harris, 
who  had_been  Jim  Riley's  school 
teacher;  and  took  due  note  of  the 
schoolhouse  where  Riley,  like  the 
bard  of  Stratford,  got  not  only 
his  first  principles  of  learning,  but 
also  his  first  taste  of  the  drama's 
delights.  It  was  there,  he  told  me, 
that  he  saw  his  first  play,  "The 
Corsican  Brothers."  The  rapture 
of  that  occasion  left  an  ineffaceable 
memory.  Years  later  he  saw  Henry 
39 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

Irving  in  the  same  play.  He  sat 
in  Irving's  own  box  at  the  Lyceum 
Theatre  in  London,  but  he  found 
the  play  "strangely  altered,"  and 
for  the  worse,  despite  Irving's  talents 
as  player  and  producer. 

That  Greenfield  did  not  suffice  to 
hold  Jim  Biley  was  not  to  be  won 
dered  at;  but  he  always  loved  it 
tenderly,  and  I  am  sure  he  was 
much  gratified  by  the^way  it  loved 
him.  , 

Among  his  townsfolk,  two  who 
particularly  engaged  his  interest 
were  Mr.  Will  Vawter,  an  artist, 
and  his  sister,  Miss  Clara  Vawter, 
a  delicate,  sweet  girl  with  a  mind 
rich  in  pretty  whimsies  and  quaint 
child-lore. 

Mr.  Riley  encouraged  Miss  Vawter 
to  write.  And  in  a  letter  to  me 
he  says: 

"...  Just  now  I've  another  glory  for 
you, — a  bran'-new,  shore-fer-certain  Child- 
40 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

author — or,  rather,  a  truly  gifted  writer  of 
children  and  for  them.  In  proof  of  which 
I  proudly  enclose  a  sketch  by  Miss  Clara 
Vawter — a  young  sister  of  the  artist  of  my 
last  book.  And  now  I  want  you  not  only 
to  be  rejoiced  over  this  deliciously  original 
and  wholesome  little  story,  but  to  send  its 
most  deserving  author  an  '  appreciation ' 
— only,  don't  use  that  word — they've  over 
worked  it,  East,  so  the  sweat  fairly  stands 
out  on  its  furr'ed! — What  a  joy  and  what 
a  help  it  will  be  to  her!  Possibly  you  may 
have  met  her  at  my  sister's.  If  so,  you'll 
not  have  forgotten  her.  Indeed  you  should 
know  each  other  steadfastly.  Do  send  her 
a  cheery  hail." 

And  when  I  gladly  complied,  he 
wrote: 

"  Oh,  I  knew  our  Genius  would  appre 
ciate  a  hail  from  you.  Her  letter  is  purt' 
nigh  so  good  I  don't  know  which  of  you 
ort  to  feel  most  proudest  of  th'  other'n! 
There's  where  such  real  letters  as  you  can't 
help  writing  aren't  wasted — and  I  do  want 
you  two  signed  friends  for  all  your  blessed 
literary  lives.  I  have  only  mainly  known 
41 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

her  as  a  child,  and  now — while  it's  a  be 
wildering  thing  to  realize — she  is  a  brilliant 
young  woman  every  way,  save,  I  fear, 
in  promise  of  robust  health.  That,  how 
ever,  might  be  a  condition  happily  bettered 
by  cheery,  wholesome  friends  and  their 
heartening  influence  and  advice.  Not  that 
I  gather  an  impression  of  a  melancholy 
temperament  or  tendency — but  the  con 
trary, — so  that  sound  health,  to  her, 
would  be  more  the  result  of  wholesome 
mental  food  than  that  of  the  bread-and- 
butter  variety.  Lord!  how  I'd  like,  just 
now,  to  be  a  glitteringly  keen  and  subtle- 
minded,  diplomatic  C.  E.  L.!  Then  what 
a  lovely,  lovable  task  were  mine  of  develop 
ing  this  like  gifted  sister — and  how  proud 
I'd  be  of  the  prompt  result  of  that  gracious 
interest,  seeing  her  surely  coming  into 
her  own.  ...  But  here !  I'm  not  only 
preaching  but  writing  you  a  letter.  For 
give  both,  and  know  always  I  mean  better 
than  I  do." 

It  was  my  personal  happiness  and 
editorial  good  fortune  to  publish  in 
our  weekly  a  number  of  Miss  Vaw- 
ter's  stories  of  children,  which  were 

42 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

soon    thereafter    collected   between 
covers  and  brought  out  as  a  book. 

"  Have  seen  Miss  Vawter's  prospective 
book,"  Mr.  Kiley  wrote  me,  "  very  beau 
tiful  in  type  press  and  paper, — also  her 
brother's  design  for  cover,  no  less  superb, 
alluring  and  original.  .  .  .  Did  you  name 
the  book?  It  sounds  so,  as  it's  a  happy 
title.  Mr.  Eitel  tells  me  they  hear  from 
her  and  that  she  writes  cheerily  of  her  being 
improved  and  of  final  recovery,  which,  pray 
God,  will  be  brought  about." 

But  she  went  Away — that  sweet- 
hearted,  brave-souled  girl.  I  am 
rich  in  a  score  of  charming  memo 
ries  of  her,  which  I  must  not  narrate 
here,  since  these  are  reminiscences 
of  her  friend  and  mine.  But  one 
little  flash  of  her  spirit  is  so  like 
him  as  well  as  like  her,  that  I  will 
give  it.  We  had  gone  to  a  "show" 
given  by  some  children,  a  sort  of 
"Billy  Miller's  Circus  Show"  such 
as  Riley  wrote  about.  At  the  en- 
43 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

trance  we  were  told  that  admission 
for  two  would  be  ten  pins.  Miss 
Vawter  and  I  could  not  muster 
that  number — not  even  by  being 
reckless  of  consequences.  "Could 
you,"  she  earnestly  asked  the  door 
keeper,  "could  you  change  a  hat 
pin?"  He  was  not  sure  what  the 
current  rate  of  exchange  for  hat 
pins  was;  but  after  some  grave 
consultation  about  it,  we  were  ad 
mitted. 

I  ventured,  about  that  time,  to 
ask  Mr.  Riley's  opinion  of  some 
verses  written  by  a  friend  of  mine. 
This  girl  had  had  a  pretty  severe 
struggle  against  poverty  and  other 
adverse  circumstances.  She  wrote 
well  enough  so  that  it  seemed  a 
great  pity  she  should  not  write 
better.  Dr.  John  Finley,  then  pres 
ident  of  Knox  College,  made  it  pos 
sible  for  this  girl  to  go  there,  at 
no  expense,  for  a  special  course  in 
44 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

studies  she  needed.  And  it  was 
my  happiness  to  help  her  get  to 
gether  a  wardrobe  suitable  for  col 
lege  life;  some  articles  of  this  modest 
outfit  had  been  mine,  and  to  a  cer 
tain  woman  in  Galesburg  they  looked 
far  too  modish  "for  a  girl  every 
body  knows  is  here  on  charity." 
The  remarks  of  this  woman  so 
stung  the  sensitive  spirit  of  my 
friend  that  she  was  of  a  mind  to 
flee  Galesburg  and  forego  all  that 
Knox  College  offered  her.  I  thought 
that  if  I  could  assure  her  Mr.  Riley 
found  her  talent  worthy,  she  would 
stay  and  endure  the  unjust  crit 
icism  of  her  clothes.  I  explained 
the  situation  to  the  poet,  who  re 
plied  as  follows: 

"  Truly  you  deserve  all  praise  and  wor 
ship  for  your  righteous  championship  of 
the  gifted  girl.  Her  poetry  is  genuine — 
both  the  serious  and  dialect.  Only,  she 
must  not  be  celebrating  herself  (indirectly) 
45 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

as  she  seems  to  be  doing.  If  her  present 
position  be  such  as  to  hamper  her  inde 
pendence,  let  her  accept  the  condition 
thankfully — not  combat  it  petulantly.  In 
other  words,  let  her  give  the  true  evidence 
of  her  divine  endowments  by  cheerfully 
taking  what  the  gods  allow — smiling  at 
the  small  measure,  but  not  conceitedly. 
It  seems  to  me,  had  I,  as  she,  the  large, 
gentlemanly,  arrogant,  pearl-gray-ass-of-a- 
woman  in  ostensible  charge  of  my  immortal 
soul,  that  I'd  simply  have  fun  with  her  by 
seeming  to  be  influenced  and  controlled 
by  her.  That's  the  way  to  extract  her 
fangs  and  render  her  utterly  harmless. 
Of  course,  with  all  the  fervor  of  my  heart 
I  damn  such  a  woman  and  wonder  at  God's 
lapse-evident  in  her  creation — but  only 
let  our  genius  think  how  she  herself  has 
escaped  being  such  a  personality— giving, 
thrusting  upon  God  her  thanks  by  the  hand 
ful! 

"  This  morning  I  couldn't  write — as  I  so 
wanted — knowing  and  fully  sympathizing 
with  the  spirit  of  your  last,  and  its  enclos 
ure.  Spare  yourself  all  you  can,  I  would 
say,  in  this  regard.  AVe  all  have  inescapable 
worries,  as  God  means  it, — but  we  get 
46 


JAMES   WHITCOMB   RILEY 

'  out  o'  plumb'  assuming  those  which  belong 
to  others.  We  think  we  help,  but,  nine 
times  out  o*  ten,  we  simply  hurt.  This  is 
not  a  doleful  way  of  looking  at  things 
— it's  a  fact.  When  you  are  old — as  I  am 
• — then  at  last — centuries  beyond  your 
present  youth — you  will  realize  the  stark, 
bleak  fact  of  this  unlovely  text. 

"  But  how  shall  I  write  the  poet  in  praise 
of  her  work,  unless  she  invites  my  comment? 
Most  gladly  will  I  testify  in  her  behalf, 
but  think  the  motive  should  be  sagely 
considered  and  provided  by  her.  Wouldn't 
the  really  effective  way  be  for  her  to  ask 
my  opinion?  Then,  with  feasible  occasion, 
I  might  offer  the  same  without  it  seeming 
gratuitous.  In  any  event  be  assured  I 
am  yours  to  command  even  as  you  will .  .  . 
And  so,  in  the  face  o*  the  sun  by  day 

Or  the  face  o'  the  moon  by  night, 
I    am   yours — yours — yours    to    command 

alway — 

As  you  shall  desire  so  I  shall  obey, 
Till  you'll  be  amused  and,  smiling,  say, — 

'Now  isn't  he  polite!'" 


47, 


REMINISCENCES  OF 


IV 

Jnk  Y  first  published  book — for  I 
U5J  had  written  books  since  I 
was  ten — was  a  year-book  or,  as 
it  used  to  be  called,  a  birthday 
book,  compiled  from  Riley's  poems. 

"Tennyson's  idyl,  'The  Golden  Year/ 
Mr.  Riley  wrote,  "  suggests  what  seems  to 
me  a  lovely  and  apt  name  for  your  new 
book.  Credit,  too,  for  same  may  be  in 
directly  given  the  master  by  some  stanza 
of  his  poem  to  lead  off  with — as  the  en 
closed,  for  instance,  hastily  set  down  last 
night.  Get  poem  and  look  it  over  musingly. 
And  do  agree  it's  a  be-you-tiful  title!  " 

I  did  agree.  And  "The  Golden 
Year"  it  was,  and  is.  For  a  number 
of  months  his  letters  were  full  of 
allusions  to  the  momentous  work; 
if  it  had  been  the  Century  Diction 
ary  or  the  tenth  edition  of  the  En- 
48 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

cyclopaedia  Britannica,  Mr.  Riley 
could  not  have  treated  my  editor 
ship  with  more  respect. 

Now  it  was:  "  The  Golden  Year  rounds 
on — and  is  going  into  '  proofed '  type 
script  ere  it's  trusted  to  the  printers  over 
seas." 

And  so  on,  until:  "Just  got  sight  of 
your  new  book,  and  find  it  so  beautiful  a 
volume — so  fine  of  dignity  and  character — 
that  I  must  write  you  my  instant  con 
gratulations.  Ah!  but  the  book  is  ex 
quisite!  " 

But  later,  the  inevitable!  "  I  somewhat 
grimly  smile,  calling  your  attention  to 
pages  56  and  118,  where  you've  placed  one 
and  the  identical  stanza — it  was  so  unearthly 
beautiful!  " 

Nevertheless,  I  became  at  once 
his  "favorite  author,"  and  so  re 
mained  for  some  years,  during  which 
I  was,  as  he  said,  "the  sole  living 
author  whose  only  book  is  all  about 
me."  His  letters  are  addressed 
oftener  to  "My  Dearest  F.  A.," 
49 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

"Dear  Author  Mine,"  "Dear  My 
Favorite  Author,"  than  in  any 
other  way.  Once  it  was,  "  Dear  F. 
A.  of  the  Universal  World!"  pref 
acing  a  letter  which  began:  "Now 
you  are  simply  a  supernal  being, 
beatified  in  your  opulence  of  grace 
and  loveliness.  Of  course  you're 
inspired — 'nothink  short!'  "  I  don't 
remember  what  I  had  done,  but 
it  seems  to  have  been  something, 
for  "two  certainly  highly  gifted 
young  people"  whom  Mr.  Riley 
was  trying  to  help  unto  their  own. 

It  must  have  been  the  valuable 
experience  of  transcribing  so  much 
lovely  poetry  that  emboldened  me 
to  my  one  and  only  venture  in 
verse.  I  wrote  a  birthday  sonnet 
to  Mr.  Riley.  This  was  not  re 
markable — but  my  temerity  in 
sending  it  to  him  was. 

"How    can    I    ever    answer    your    last 
letter?"  he  wrote.     "And  the  poem!    I 
50 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

am  still  dazed  with  the  revelation  of  this 
peerless  gift  of  Song  in  your  already  over 
brimmed  possession,  and  yet  mechanically 
must  cry  out  to  you: 

'  'Ware  shoal!  'ware  shoal!  'ware  shoal! ' 
not  by  any  means  that  it  isn't  good,  but 
that  it  is." 

Yet,  when  I  inscribed  for  him 
a  copy  of  "The  Golden  Year"  with 
some  of  his  own  lines,  he  chided  me : 

"  Why  didn't  you  inscribe  it  with  lines 
of  your  own  verse?  which  same  I  know  you 
can  do  with  both  force  and  grace.  And 
here  again  I  charge  you  not  to  neglect  your 
serious  exercise  of  that  poetic  gift,  for  you 
know  not  to  what  high  worth  it  may 
develop  in  your  chosen  field  of  letters — 
indeed,  that  expression  might  in  time  come 
to  be  your  best, — as,  see  vol.  '  In  this 
Our  World,'  by  Charlotte  Perkins  Stetson,— 
a  truly  '  mighty  line '  she  has  just  given 
the  world,  and  which  I've  been  trying  to 
give  you,  but  the  booksellers  can't  secure 
even  one  copy  of  it.  If  you  can  do  so  there 
in  Chicago,  swoop  down  upon  it  with 
wildest  beak,  talons,  and  rush  of  wings! 
51 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

Later,  some  time,  then,  I  may  tell  you  how, 
four  or  five  years  ago,  I  met  the  then 
unknown  poet  in  Oakland,  California, 
where  she  was  one  of  our  happy  party 
on  a  visit  to  Joaquin  Miller,  with  whose  old 
mother  and  himself  we  joyously  dined. 
So,  whatever  you  do  (since  I  can't)  get  at 
once  a  copy  of  Mrs.  Stetson's  poems: 
4  In  This  Our  World.'" 

Two  weeks  later  he  urges :  "  See  at  once 
splendid  character  comment  in  Feb.  '  Cur 
rent  Literature '  of  our  '  Stout  Stetson, 
as  with  eagle-eye  she  looks  on  the  Pacific,' 
holding  the  proud  Y^orld  o'er  it  by  the  tail! 
Do  find  where  she's  to  be  found  and  write 
her,  and  send  her  address  to  me." 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 


kept  an  eager  lookout  in 
those  days  for  the  fresh,  new 
voices  in  prose  and  poetry.  It  was 
he  who  sent  me  the  first  thing  of 
W.  B.  Yeats'  that  I  ever  saw:  a 
thin  little  copy  of  "The  Land  of 
Heart's  Desire,"  bound  in  gray 
boards;  and  on  the  fly-leaf  Mr. 
Biley  wrote  these  lines,  which  are 
so  lovely  that  they  cannot  be  called 
a  parody;  he  called  them,  in  the 
caption, 

"  Yatesesque: 
The  wind  blows  over  the  hills  of  dawn, 

The  wind  blows  over  the  heavy  of  heart — 
And  the  heavy  heart  aches  on  and  on, 

While  the  dancing  fairies  wheel  and  part, 

Twirling  their  star-white  feet  in  a  round — 

Waving  their  moon-white  arms  in  the  air, 

Till  the  low  wind  leaps,  with  a  laughing 

sound, 

53 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

And  sings  of  a  land  where  the  old  are  fair — 
Where  the  old  are  fair,  and  the  sad  are  gay, 

And  life  lives  on,  and  death  is  gone — 
Where  love  and  loveliness  wear  alway, 

And  never  a  heart  aches  on  and  on." 

The  lines  which  suggested  these 
I  give  also,  that  those  who  care 
to  may  compare  them  with  Riley's. 
They  are  the  lines  sung  outside 
Maurteen  Bruin's  house  by  the 
faery  child  before  she  enters  and 
after  she  leaves. 

"The  wind  blows  out  of  the  gates  of  the 

day, 

The  wind  blows  over  the  lonely  of  heart, 

And  the  lonely  of  heart  is  withered  away, 

While  the  faeries  dance  in  a  place  apart, 

Shaking  their  milk-white  feet  in  a  ring, 

Tossing  their  milk-white  arms  in  the 

air; 
For  they  hear  the  wind  laugh  and  murmur 

and  sing 

Of  a  land  where  even  the  old  are  fair, 
And  even  the  wise  are  merry  of  tongue; 
But  I  heard  a  reed  of  Coolaney  say, 
54 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

'  When  the  wind  has  laughed  and  mur 
mured  and  sung, 

The    lonely    of     heart    must    wither 
away.* '" 

Another  author  who  should  have 
done  her  best  to  have  me  shot  at 
sunrise  or  hanged  at  high  noon 
"  of  a  Friday "  was  Alice  French 
(Octave  Thanet),  from  whom  I  un- 
blushingly  beguiled  every  now  and 
then  a  three  hundred  or  five  hun 
dred  dollar  story  for  about  four 
dollars  and  ninety-eight  cents.  But 
a  bigger  heart  than  hers  never  beat; 
and  instead  of  treating  me  as  I 
deserved,  she  did  me  a  multitude 
of  charming  kindnesses,  personal 
as  well  as  "  professional."  For  in 
stance,  having  found  much  to  thrill 
her  in  W.  E.  Henley's  poems,  she 
bought  at  Scribners',  in  New  York, 
a  copy  for  me,  and  wrote  me  that 
it  was  on  the  way.  When  it  was 
some  time  overdue,  I  told  her. 
55 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

She  ordered  a  second  copy — and 
they  both  came  in  one  mail.  "  Send 
the  duplicate  to  anyone  who  may 
care  for  it,"  she  directed  me.  I 
sent  it  to  Mr.  Riley,  who  wrote  of  it: 

"  I  don't  like  the  man — the  man  so  greatly 
endowed  of  God  as  he,  and  yet  deliberately 
and  elaborately  crying  out  against  Him 
and  His  dispensations  irks  an  optimistic 
kuss  like  me  immeasurably:  All  I  most 
marvel  at  is  therefore  dubious, — sometimes 
it  seems  the  man's  transcendent  genius, 
and  then  it  seems  God's  patience — 

But,  anyway,  I  s'pose, 

'  He  knows — He  knows — HE  knows! '  " 

Later,  in  talking  to  me  about 
Henley,  he  expressed  enormous  con 
trition  for  that  letter.  "I  didn't 
know,  when  I  wrote  it,  what  he 
has  had  to  fight  against,"  he  said, 
humbly.  "Good  Lord!  dying  by 
inches  in  that  hideous  way!  And 
having  to  see  that  child  die!  I'm 
sorry  I  ever  said  anything.  Per- 
56 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

haps  if  I  were  in  his  place  I'd  cry, 
too,  about  '  the  night  that  covers 
me,  black  as  the  pit  from  pole  to 
pole!'  " 

Henley's  savage  attack  on  Ste 
venson  was  hard  for  Mr.  Riley 
to  forgive;  but  I  know  he  tried 
to  feel  the  situation  from  Henley's 
side. 

"  Both  of  them  physically  frail, 
handicapped  by  almost  continual 
suffering,"  he  said;  "  and  yet  one 
is  worshipped  by  all  the  world  as 
its  apostle  of  sweet  courage,  and  the 
other  wins  respect  from  a  few  as 
the  apostle  of  grim  endurance.  I 
think  I  can  understand  how  Henley 
feels.  But  it's  too  bad !  Too  bad !  " 

Riley 's  enthusiasm  for  Stevenson 
was  beautiful.  I  can  remember  his 
asking  me  with  great  wistfulness 
if  I  thought  Stevenson  had  ever 
seen  anything  he  (Riley)  had  written. 
And  I  know  that  once,  passing  a 
57 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

theatre  in  Indianapolis,  he  was  at 
tracted  by  the  announcement  that 
E.  J.  Henley  was  playing  there. 
Reflecting  that  this  man  must  have 
had  some  acquaintance  with  Steven 
son,  Mr.  Eiley  sought  the  stage- 
door  and  sent  in  his  card.  His 
mood  was  that  which  Browning 
so  simply  and  exquisitely  conveyed 
in  "  Memorabilia": 

"  And  did  you  once  see  Shelley,  plain? 
And  did  he  stop  and  speak  to  you? 
And  did  you  speak  to  him  again? 
How  strange  it  seems,  and  new! " 

The  actor  received  Mr.  Riley 
graciously,  but  his  grace  evanished 
quickly  when  he  learned  why  his 
visitor  had  come. 

"  Stevenson?  "  he  said,  as  if  he 
recalled  only  with  an  effort  his 
brother's  long-time  friend.  "  Ste 
venson?  Ah,  yes — yes!  A  queer 
person!  Liked  to  wear  a  velvet 
58 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

coat — and  all  that  sort  o'  thing, 
don't  ye  know." 

That  was  all.  But  Mr.  Riley 
could  never  forget  it. 

Once  he  said  to  me:  "  Did  you 
ever  know  that  until  after  he  was 
grown  and  mustached  Stevenson 
was  a  blonde?  That  his  hair  didn't 
darken  until  he  was  past  his  ma 
jority?  " 

I  had  not  known  it;  but  it 
transpired  that  he  had  found  a 
portrait  of  Stevenson  which  was 
taken  when  he  was  almost  as  fair  as 
Riley's  flaxen  self. 

"  I  wrote  some  maundering  verses  to  it," 
— he  told  me  in  a  letter,  afterwards,  "nay 
to  the  lovely  man  himself — sent  picture 
and  lines  to  magazine  and  publishing 
house,  and  they  wrote  to  say  portrait 
and  verses  would  appear  in  their  Christmas 
magazine,  and  enclosed  a  great  corpulent 
check  which  I  had  not  dreamed  of  in  such 
connection — so  returned  it,  coyly  saying 
even  if  I  had  intended  the  lines  for  money, 
59 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

their  check  was  in  vast  excess  of  their 
worth — but  if,  in  lieu  of  such  sordid  com 
pensation,  Robert  Louis  Stevenson's  pub 
lishers  were  to  send  me  a  set  of  his  books, 
it  would  seem  to  me  about  all  the  recom 
pense  I  could  bear. 

"Well,  now  here's  where  only  a  poet  can 
humor  and  account  for  the  doings  of 
Divinity : — As  I  stepped  out  into  the  golden 
morning-edge  of  my  very  recentest  birth 
day,  Robert  Louis  Stevenson  was  blithely 
seeing  to  it  that  his  books  were  being 
then  and  there  delivered  into  my  hands 
by  the  expressman  who  looked  and  acted 
just  for  the  world  as  though  he  were  deliver 
ing  the  package  to  me — even  made  me  sign 
something  to  that  effect,  I  think!  " 

The  temptation  to  go  on  and  on 
quoting  what  he  said  and  wrote 
about  other  authors  is  very  great. 
But  I  will  withstand  it,  save  for 
a  very  few  concessions. 

I  recall  his  ardent  championship 
of  Longfellow,  and  his  bitterness 
against  those  who  spoke  contempt- 
60 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

uously  of  Longfellow's  flowing 
rhyme  and  rhythm,  as  if  his  thought 
must  be  less  noble  because  it  could 
be  .understood  without  a  "key"; 
and  as  if  his  poetry  must  have  been 
effortless  because  it  could  be  mem 
orized  so  easily. 

"  Nobody  knows  any  better  than 
I  do,"  Mr.  Riley  said  to  me,  "  how 
hard  it  is  to  write  such  measures 
as  '  The  Psalm  of  Life.'  " 

He  could  not  understand  why 
Browning,  if  he  believed  in  the 
worth  of  his  message  to  the  world, 
was  not  more  concerned  than  he 
seemed  to  be  that  so  small  part 
of  the  world  could  comprehend  it. 

Of  all  his  literary  loves,  though, 
none  was  so  strong  as  that  he  had 
for  Burns: 

"  Sweet  singer  that  I  lo'e  the  maist 
O'  ony,  sin'  wi'  eager  haste 
I  smacket  bairn-lips  ower  the  taste 
0*  hinnied  Sang." 
61 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

Burns  in  verse,  and  Dickens  in 
prose.  "  Am  just  reading,"  he  wrote 
in  April,  '99,  "  the  priruest,  finest, 
most  mellerest,  ripest  and  juiciest 
of  all  novels  ever  writ!  Wonder 
if  you've  run  acrost  it  yet?  It  is 
called  s  David  Copperfield.'  '  Ah, 
mountain  pine  and  stately  Kentish 
spire!  Ye  have  one  tale  to  tell! '  " 

His  feeling  for  Poe  is  so  well 
known  that  I  offer  no  comment  on 
it  here,  save  such  as  may  throw 
for  some  persons  a  new  light  on 
that  affinity :  James  Whitcomb  Riley 
came  into  the  world  on  the  day  that 
Edgar  Allan  Poe  went  out  of  it". 
To  a  mind  so  sensitive,  so  imagina 
tive  as  Riley's,  this  could  not  be 
without  more  significance  than  a 
mere  coincidence. 


JAMES  WHITCOMB   RILEY 


VI 

«fT  CANNOT  recall  with  any  ex- 

II  actitude  the  "  first  beginnings  " 
of  the  compilation  called  "  Riley 
Love  Lyrics";  that  is,  whether  we 
thought  first  of  the  volume  and 
then  of  the  illustrator,  or  first  of 
the  illustrator  and  then  of  the 
volume. 

Mr.  William  B.  Dyer  was  one  of 
the  first — if  not  the  very  first  in 
deed! — in  Chicago  to  open  a  studio 
for  the  "  new  "  photography  which 
was  so  wonderfully  different  from 
the  "  old."  He  had  made  many 
studies  of  me,  and  of  people  I  knew, 
and  I  was  deeply  interested  in  his 
art.  It  was  probably  my  sugges 
tion  that  his  pictures  would  beau 
tifully  illustrate  certain  poems  (he 
is  a  very  modest  gentleman,  and 
63 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

I  am  sure  he  didn't  suggest  it),  and 
it  may  well  have  been  I  who  thought 
first  of  Riley  poems. 

We  sent  down  to  Mr.  Riley  a 
number  of  Mr.  Dyer's  pictures, 
with  a  plan  for  the  proposed  book. 

"At  once,"  he  wrote,  "I'll  take  the 
lovely  pictures  to  the  B — M's — this  im 
mediate  now.  All  I  can  say  is  in  the  assur 
ance  of  my  consent  to  the  artist's  scheme 
should  my  publishers  indorse  same.  So 
please  inform  the  gifted  man  of  my  hale 
appreciation  of  his  work,  which  I  fervently 
trust  may  meet  the  like  estimate  of  the 
publishers.  Would  advise  you  to  write 
them,  as  an  appeal  from  you  to  them  would 
far  outweigh  the  very  heftiest  one  of  mine." 

It  was,  of  course,  not  my  "  ap 
peal  "  at  all,  but  his  enthusiasm 
for  the  project  and  Mr.  Dyer's 
capability  for  it  that  enlisted  the 
publishers.  And  in  a  short  while 
work  on  the  volume  was  begun.  I 
believe  I  selected  the  poems — sub- 
64 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY  " 

ject  to  Mr.  Biley's  approval  and 
to  Mr.  Dyer's  acceptance  of  them 
as  illustratable  with  a  camera.  And 
for  further  contribution,  I  posed 
for  some  of  the  pictures  and  acted 
as  consulting  "  authority  "  on  the 
types  to  be  used  for  others.  That 
is  not  to  say  that  I  presumed  to 
offer  Mr.  Dyer  any  artistic  sug 
gestions — only,  to  help  him  from 
time  to  time  with  guesses  as  to 
what  I  thought  would  best  express 
the  poet's  idea.  When  I  couldn't 
guess,  I  asked  the  poet.  Witness: 

"  MY  DEAR  LADY  GLENDOWER: 

"As  best  I  can  here  do  I  answer  your 
order  of  questions — only  wishing  you  had 
asked  more,  and  more  difficult  ones.  1st. 
The  fair  girl  whose  father  called  her  in  and 
shut  the  door  was  twelve  years  of  age, 
perhaps,  and  the  dark,  eerie  child  was 
younger  by  two  years,  about.  (Mighty 
glad  that  poem  is  selected,  as  it  has  always 
been  a  favorite  one,  though  why  it  is  I 
don't  know,  any  more  than  I  don't  know 
65 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

whence  it  sprung  or  what  the  little  change 
ling  mystical  bit  is  all  about.) 

"  2d.  I  think  it  may  be  either  a  man  or 
a  woman  who  prays  '  Let  not  this  New  Year 
be  as  happy  as  the  old! '  It's  a  mature, 
sensible  lover,  man  or  woman,  with  no 
golf-links  background. 

"  3d.  '  His  Vigil '  is  the  same  married  man 
who  utterly  loves  his  wife  in  sonnet  '  When 
She  Comes  Home.'  No,  he  is  not  ill — but 
sick  of  himself,  and  wants  to  be  simply 
tolerated,  all  in  the  dark  and  the  silence, 
by  his  divine  superior,  her  human  hand 
holding  his  own. 

"  4th.  '  The  Passing  of  a  Heart '  is  a  noble 
woman  lied  to  by  the  husband  who  proves 
(very  naturally)  the  opposite  of  all  he 
promised  ere  they  were  one. — John  Hay 
has  a  distitch  som'er's  which  wisely  bids 
the  maiden : — '  Marry  whomsoever  thou 
wilt,  and  thou  wilt  find  thou  hast  married 
somebody  else.' 

"  The  old  savant  will  be  delighted  to  an 
swer  any  question  you  can  skeer  up.  Just 
as  easy  to  him  as  it  was  to  Merlin  when 
the  wily  Vivian  inquired  '  Prithee,  O  sire 
adorable,  why  is  't  the  sweetest  love  must 
66 


(fMA^tr  -Mr«-^ 
0 


«ix^4  W( 


3 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

needs  seem  e'en  the  saddest? '  and  he 
promptly  answered,  with  his  twinkless 
eyes  fixed  full  on  space,  *  Because  God 
loves  the  Irish.* 

"Wid  a  wurrld  av  bewilderin'  wishes, 
"  Your  always  grateful 

"Jamesy  O'Reilly." 

It  was  this  "  Jamesy  "  who  wrote 
to  me  always  in  the  gayest  moods. 
"  Dear  F.  A.,"  another  of  his  letters 
begins,  "  which  here  means  Fellow 
American: 

"  Till  this  blessed  minute  I've  not  had 
the  chanst  to  thank  yez  for  the  lavish 
bunch  of  papers.  [Copies  of  our  weekly 
containing  his  poem  *  Billy  Miller's  Circus 
Show,'  for  the  publication  of  which  he 
seemed  as  eager  as  if  it  were  his  first  appear 
ance  in  print.]  Sure  they  were  daisies — 
wid  shamrocks  mixed  amongst  'um  thick 
as  the  sthars  be  curdled  in  The  Milky  Way! 
An*  thank  an'  praise  ye  likewise  for  the 
wrappers  of  the  same — wid  every  con- 
vainince  on  'um  but  the  paste  an'  postage- 
67 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

stamps!      So    like    yer    own    foresighted 
thought!  ulness ! 

"As  ever  your  grateful,  fraternal  and  eternal 
"Jarnesy  O'Reilly." 

In  the  margin  of  this  letter  is  the 
following: 

"  Kate  Shane,  the  coquette  iv  all  Dayton, 
Heart-struck  wid  a  strange  palpitaatin', 
Called  Docther  McGrothin, 
Who  said  it  were  nawthin* 
But  somethin'  the  gyurl  had  been  aitin'! " 


68 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 


VII 

are  many  memories  of 
him  which  I  find  it  hard  to 
group.  And  yet,  because  each  one 
of  them  is  characteristic  and  illu 
minative,  I  cannot  bear  to  leave 
them  out. 

I  often  asked  him  for  verification 
or  denial  of  certain  stories  about 
him.  One  that  came  to  me  was 
that  he  had  been  a  guest  of  Mrs. 
Humphrey  Ward's  at  a  time  when 
that  distinguished  lady  was  much 
interested  in  the  mysteries  of  the 
planchette  or  ouija-board.  The 
story  ran  that  Mr.  Riley,  on  being 
asked  from  whom  he  would  like  a 
message,  promptly  replied  "  Charles 
Lamb."  (I  should  have  said  some 
thing  about  his  great  fondness  for 
Lamb.)  Thereupon  he  put  his  hands 
69 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

on  the  little  table,  as  directed,  and 
it  began  to  move  about  among  the 
letters  of  the  alphabet  painted  on  the 
underlying  board.  To  Mrs.  Ward's 
mortification,  it  picked  out  a  string 
of  consonants  from  which  no  pos 
sible  word  could  be  guessed.  She 
apologized  to  Mr.  Riley  for  the 
ouija's  misbehavior.  He  looked  sur 
prised.  "  Why,"  he  murmured, 
"that's  all  right.  Lamb  stuttered, 
you  know." 

To  this  Mr.  Riley  pleaded  guilty. 

Another  story,  a  very  touching 
one,  had  it  that  in  his  young  man 
hood  Mr.  Riley,  desperately  enam 
ored  of  Ella  Wheeler  (now  Mrs. 
Wilcox)  and  failing  to  win  her, 
vowed  himself  to  celibacy.  He  lis 
tened  attentively  till  I  got  to  the 
end.  Then:  "  That's  very  inter 
esting,"  he  declared,  enthusiastically; 
"  and  it's  all  perfectly  true — except 
that  I  never  saw  the  lady!  " 
70 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

This  was  what  the  children  call 
"a  naughty  story";  for  he  had 
seen  the  lady.  But  perhaps  that 
was  just  his  way  of  evading  a 
question  I  had  no  right  to  ask. 

Once  I  ventured  to  ask  him  why 
he  didn't  write  more  sonnets. 

"  Because,"  he  answered,  dryly, 
"  the  only  people  who  read  sonnets 
expect  presentation  copies." 

He  fumbled  in  his  pockets  one 
day  when  I  was  talking  with  him, 
and  brought  out  a  bit  of  paper. 

"  Here's  something  I've  been 
'plumbing  on,"  he  said.  "  Like  to 
have  it  tried  on  you?  5} 

It  was  "Old  Glory"!  And  how 
he  read  it!  I  wanted  to  know  what 
he  was  going  to  do  with  it.  "  Oh, 
nothing,  yet,"  he  assured  me.  It 
was  not  polished  to  his  satisfaction. 
I  must  have  had  the  unbelievable 
temerity  to  ask  him  for  it.  Be 
cause  he  wrote  me: 
71 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

"  As  to  the  '  Old  Glory  '  poem,  I'm  proud 
you  want  it,  though  I  can't  surrender  it 
to  the  world  at  large  just  yet.  In  fact, 
it  still  remains  unfinished,  and  when  I 
shall  be  able  to  complete  it  to  my  satis 
faction  I've  no  idea  under  the  heavens." 

And  later,  replying  to  my  letter 
when  I  had  seen  the  poem  and  a 
beautiful  article  about  the  poet, 
in  The  Atlantic  Monthly,  he  said: 
"  DEAR  MY  FAVORITE  AUTHOR: 

"  Yes,  it  was  lovely  of  The  Atlantic  and  the 
peerless  Carman  to  set  me  forth  as  they 
so  generously  have!  And  I've  been  trying 
to  thank  them,  though  I  fear  all  too  stam- 
meringly  to  be  clearly  understood — as 
the  measure  of  my  appreciation  and  grati 
tude  was,  and  is,  quite  beyond  just  expres 
sion.  As  to  the  poem,  your  praise  of  that 
demands  like  acknowledgment,  though  I 
spare  you  now — but  must  tell  you  that 
the  girth  of  the  check  for  it  would  seem 
to  endorse  your  own  exalted  estimate  of 
its  worth.  So  that,  as  Mrs.  Browning  only 
could  express  it, 

"  *  I  stand  too  high  for  astonishment.' 

"  God  bless  us,  every  one!  " 
72 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

"Say  'Illileo,'"  I  urged  him, 
one  evening  when  we  were  sitting 
out  under  the  trees  and  something 
had  brought  to  my  mind  his  haunt- 
ingly  lovely,  richly  musical  lines 
in  that  poem. 

"  Don't  know  it,"  he  answered. 

"  I  do,"  I  replied.  "  Go  ahead— 
I'll  prompt  you." 

"I'll  bet  you  do!"  he  chuckled; 
and  began. 

He  did  know  it.  And  as  he  pro 
ceeded,  the  dripping,  honey-golden 
lusciousness  of  his  own  verse  en 
chanted  him  as  it  was  enchanting 
me.  The  beauty,  the  warmth,  the 
music  of  his  voice  was  all  too  inde 
scribable. 

"  'And  I  held  you  in  my  bosom,  as  the 
husk  may  hold  the  fruit.'  " 

"  God! "  he  said,  fervently,  "  that 
is  a  beautiful  line!  .  .  .  You  know 
how  I  mean  that?  " 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

I  did. 

"  Many  people  wouldn't,"  he  went 
on,  plaintively. 

"  No.  .  .  .  Do  you  recall  in  Henry 
van  Dyke's  reminiscences  of  Tenny 
son  that  once  when  reading  aloud 
to  Dr.  van  Dyke,  Tennyson  said 
something  similar?  The  line  at 
which  he  exclaimed  was:  'The 
league-long  rollers  broke  in  thunder 
on  the  beach.'  And  as  Tennyson 
boomed  it  forth  in  his  great  voice 
the  effect  was  truly  superb." 

"  Didn't  van  Dyke  understand?  " 

"Oh,  yes!" 

"  My  God!  No  poet  is  ever  com 
placent.  How  can  anybody  think 
it?  The  torment  of  the  difference 
we  feel  between  the  thing  visioned 
and  the  thing  transcribed  is  more 
than  enough  to  keep  us  in  hell. 
And  when  you  do  find  that  you've 
got  a  glint  of  the  real  glory  in  some 
thing  you've  done,  do  you  get 
74 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

complacent?  No!  You  feel  as  if 
the  Lord  had  sent  it  to  you,  all 
faceted  and  flawless,  and  let  you 
set  it  in  with  your  own  fumblings. 
Proud?  No!  You're  just  a'mighty 
grateful!  'J 

His  understanding  of  human 
nature  was  introspective  and  in 
tuitive,  I  think — seldom,  if  ever, 
deductive  and  analytical.  He  did 
not  readily  establish  points  of  easy 
contact  with  other  people,  and  he 
was  not  happy  with  strangers.  He 
seemed  afraid  to  be  himself  with 
them,  for  fear  they  would  not  under 
stand,  and  his  sensitiveness  was  so 
great  that  he  could  scarcely  have 
borne  misunderstanding.  I  am  sure 
he  was  right  in  his  feeling  about 
this;  though  often  one  wished  he 
were  not  so  loath  to  "  be  met." 
He  hated  "  lionizing,"  not  because 
he  didn't  like  being  a  lion — for  I 
am  convinced  he  did — but  because 
75 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

of  the  dismal  inability  of  most  per 
sons  to  treat  lions  in  any  way  which 
does  not  put  them  and  keep  them 
at  a  disadvantage.  He  knew  he 
was  not  at  his  best  when  "  lionized  " 
— indeed,  that  he  was  quite  at  his 
worst.  And  no  one  can  blame  him 
for  shying  from  the  experience. 

"  I  stand  on  one  foot/'  he  com 
plained  to  me,  whimsically,  "  and 
then  on  the  other  foot.  And  I 
don't  know  what  to  say." 

His  intimates  understood  this  so 
well  that  they  seldom  or  never  tried 
to  show  him  off. 

But  I  recall  one  occasion  when  a 
few  of  his  closest  friends  conspired 
against  him  in  behalf  of  a  very 
worthy  candidate  for  the  honor  of 
Riley's  acquaintance.  This  gentle 
man  was  a  physician  in  southern 
Illinois.  He  had  just  published  a 
charming  book  of  boy  life  in  the 
country,  rich  in  such  human  nature 
76 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

as  Kiley  knew  and  loved  best.  He 
was  the  quietest,  shyest  person  im 
aginable,  but  he  had  mustered  cour 
age  to  come  to  Indianapolis  in  the 
hope  of  seeing  Mr.  Riley,  whom  he 
had  idolized  from  afar. 

I  was  one  of  those  who  plotted 
to  introduce  this  gentleman  into  a 
small  circle  of  friends  with  whom 
Mr.  Riley  was  so  much  at  ease 
that  he  might  forget  the  presence 
of  one  stranger.  His  publishers 
were  party  to  the  plot,  and  the 
episode  was  "  staged  "  in  the  private 
office  of  Mr.  Bobbs. 

The  gentleman  on  pilgrimage  was 
introduced;  and  then  everyone 
worked  mightily  to  start  talk  that 
might  lure  Mr.  Riley  from  his  silence. 
But  he  was  like  the  Tar-Baby:  "he 
kep'  on  say  in'  nothinV 

I  cannot  remember  how  or  why 
we  talked  of  Hamlet.  Perhaps  some 
one  was  playing  it  in  Indianapolis. 
77 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

But  I  know  we  were  getting  rather 
desperate. 

"  I'd  like,"  someone  said,  "to  see 
Hamlet  played  by  a  fair-haired  Dane. 
I'm  tired  of  brunette  melancholy." 

"  Or  by  a  fat  man,"  another  inter 
posed.  "  Hamlet  himself  says  he  is 
fat  and  scant  of  breath." 

And  so  on.  It  was  all  very  forced 
and  foolish;  but  the  Tar-Baby  had 
us  almost  hysterically  self-conscious. 
Finally  someone  was  emboldened  to 
abandon  strategy  and  lead  a  direct 
attack. 

"  How  would  you  like  to  see 
'  Hamlet '  played,  Mr.  Riley?  "  he 
asked. 

Mr.  Riley  appeared  to  consider. 

"  I'd  like  to  see  it  played  by  a 
picked  nine,"  he  replied,  gravely. 

That  was  his  total  contribution. 
But  there  have  been  pilgrims  to 
shrines  of  greatness  who  have  fared 
worse. 

78 


JAMES   WHITCOMB   RILEY 


VIII 

was  the  poet  of  child- 
hood;  but  unless  I  grievously 
misread  him,  he  was  not  fond  of 
children  in  the  way  that  we  are  who 
love  to  have  them  around.  He 
delighted  in  his  memories  of  his  own 
childhood  and  in  fancies,  whimsies, 
those  memories  inspired;  but  on 
the  occasions  when  I  knew  him  in 
the  actual  presence  of  flesh-and-blood 
youngsters,  he  was  inclined  to  be 
easily  disturbed  by  their  behavior. 

I  think  his  vivid  recollections  of 
how  he  felt  when  he  was  a  little 
boy  made  him  critical  of  the  attitude 
of  most  grown-ups  toward  small 
persons;  and  he  may  have  been 
fearful  of  seeming  to  childish  minds 
no  better  than  the  rest  of  the  bungle- 
79 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

some  adult  world.  He  talked  to 
me  once  of  how  it  made  him  shrink 
and  shrivel  to  see  people  pounce 
at  a  strange  child  and  expect  instant 
intimacy  from  it.  He  respected  the 
child-mind  far  too  much  for  that. 

I  have  seen  him  sit  in  a  room  with 
a  shy  little  girl  and  appear  not  to 
notice  her;  but  to  keep  juggling  or 
"  palming  "  a  half  -  dollar  —  in  a 
"  now  -  you  -  see  -  it  -  now  -  you  - 
don't "  way — until  she  was  beside 
him,  trying  to  see  where  it  went  to 
when  it  went  away.  Nor  would 
he  presume  upon  that  show  of  in 
tellectual  interest,  to  put  his  arm 
around  her  or  chuck  her  under  the 
chin — let  alone  to  tell  her,  in  the 
uncouth  jocosity  of  persons  who  are 
sure  they  "love  children,"  that  he 
was  going  to  steal  her. 

He  had  a  deep  sense,  I  am  sure,  of 
the  dignity  and  aloofness  of  young 
souls.  He  knew  how  tolerant  they 
80 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

have  to  be  of  parents  and  other 
elders.  Youth,  far  from  thawing 
his  shyness,  seemed  rather  to  increase 
it.  If  he  was  ever  at  his  best  when 
talking  with  children,  those  were 
times  I  had  not  the  happiness 
to  share.  Yet  children  felt  the 
witchery  of  his  personality,  and  I 
have  known  them  to  sit  spellbound 
by  his  talk  with  their  elders. 

One  Sunday  evening  so  early  in 
my  visits  to  Indianapolis  that  "  Ed  " 
was  still  a  small  boy,  Elva  Eitel  and 
little  Ed  and  I  were  returning  to 
their  home  from  having  spent  some 
enchanted  hours  at "  Aunt  Mamie's" 
with  "  Uncle  Jim."  I  daresay  Elva 
and  I  did  not  leave  many  pauses — 
we  seldom  did — but  Ed  was  very 
quiet,  even  for  him. 

As  we  neared  home  he  said: 

"  Do  you  know  what  I've  been 
thinking?  " 

We  didn't. 

81 


REMINISCENCES   OF 

"  I've  been  thinking  that  the  most 
fascinating  thing  in  the  whole  world 
is  to  hear  Uncle  Jim  talk." 

We  agreed  with  him. 

Yet,  not  once  all  evening  had  his 
Uncle  Jim  directed  a  fragment  of 
conversation  "  at  "  Ed. 

This  may  have  been  instinct  with 
Mr.  Eiley,  or  it  may  have  been 
memory,  or  it  may  have  been  canny, 
mature  wisdom.  But  whatever  it 
was,  I  often  wish  more  people  had  it. 

It  was  a  strange  relationship: 
he  valued  them  not  for  what  they 
gave  him  of  pleasure  or  understand 
ing,  but  for  all  that  "  wonderland  of 
wayward  childhood "  they  helped 
him  to  recall;  and  they  valued  him 
because  he  seemed  to  take  them  for 
granted,  as  if  they  were  grown-ups, 
making  no  insulting  condescensions 
to  them,  but  allowing  them  to  form 
their  own  opinions  of  his  worth. 

The  first  of  his  books  that  he  gave 
82 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

me  has  these  lines  of  special  inscrip 
tion: 

"'  O   Wonderland   of   wayward   Childhood! 

What 

An  easy,  breezy  realm  of  summer  calm 
And  dreamy  gleam  and  gloom  and  bloom 

and  balm 

Thou  art !    The  Lotus-Land  the  poet  sung, 
It  is  the  Child- World  while  the  heart  beats 
young." 

And  in  the  proem  to  that  volume 
he  sang: 

"O   Child-World:    After   this  world— just 

as  when 

I  found  you  first  sufficed 
My  soulmost  need — if  I  found  you  again, 
With  all  my  childish  dreams  so  realized, 
I  should  not  be  surprised." 

I  wrote,  once  on  a  time,  for 
The  Book  Buyer,  a  little  article 
about  Riley's  poems  of  childhood, 
and  when  it  was  ready  for  the 
printers  I  sent  it  to  him  for  correc 
tions  or  suggestions. 
83 


REMINISCENCES   OF 

"  Of  course,"  lie  wrote,  "  I  approve  the 
enclosed  pages  of  praises  of  my  boyhood 
muse — though  you're  a  gentler  one.  Voice 
less,  therefore,  in  awe  of  reverence  I  bow. 
Nor  think  my  attitude  less  worshipful 
when  you  find  my  pencil-marks,  O  so 
delicately  trenching  on  your  lines  at  times. 

"  On  page  7,  upper  page,  your  comment 
reminds  me,  too,  that  you  might  find  for 
it  a  fit  quotation  from  a  little  poem  in  '  Ar- 
mazindy*  vol.,  I  think.  I  forget  its  exact 
title,  but  it's  about  a  '  Dear  child-hearted 
Woman  that  is  dead  ' — and  God  hears  her 
spirit  whisper,  just  as  He  has  made  a 
stately  angel  of  her,  and  in  a  twinkling  she 
is  a  little  child." 

His  ability,  in  story-telling,  to 
personate  a  little  boy  was  more 
than  consummate  histrionism;  there 
was  something  psychic  in  it — as  if 
the  little  boy  he  used  to  be  came 
back  at  times,  not  only  in  the 
poet's  mind,  but  in  his  looks  and 
voice  and  movements.  I  have  heard 
few  things  more  wonderful  than 
84 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

his  narration  of  "  Bud's  Bear  Story." 
It  seemed  to  me  as  if  I  could  see 
the  workings  of  Bud's  mind,  as  he 
conceived  it  point  by  point — that 
marvellous  tale  of  the  little  boy 
in  the  woods,  who,  being  chased  by 
a  bear,  "  clumb  "  a  tree,  the  bear 
pursuing.  "  Bud's  "  excitement  as 
his  hero  "haf  to  stay  up  in  the 
tree — all  night — "  with  the  bear 
below  going  "  Wooh  !  woo — wooh! " 
was  all  evident  in  his  face.  Then — ! 
never,  until  in  that  other  Child- 
World  I  come  up  with  him  again, 
shall  I  see  anything  like  the  expres 
sion  on  Bud's  face,  when  he  thought 
how  to  save  his  hero. 

"  The  old  Bear  finds  the  Little  Boy's  gun, 

you  know, 
'  At's  on  the  ground. — (An*  it  ain't  broke 

at  all— 
I  'ist  said  that!)  An'  so   the   old   Bear 

think 

He'll  take  the  gun  an'  shoot  the  Little 
Boy:—" 

85 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

But  shoots  himself  instead! 

One  often  feels  the  authors  of 
adventure  stories  caught  in  traps 
of  their  own  contriving;  but  one 
seldom  meets  another  so  deliciously 
frank  as  "  Bud." 

Another  masterpiece  of  what  I 
can  only  call  reincarnation  was  the 
boy  who  was  not  going  to  say  his 
prayers  cc  to-night,  ner  to-morrow 
night,  ner  the  nex'  night.  An' 
after  that,  if  nothin'  happens,  I 
ain't  ever  goin'  to  say  'em."  But 
the  nature  of  the  thing  he  was 
pretty  sure  would  happen  filled 
him  with  a  terror  which  his  bravado 
could  scarcely  overcome. 

How  much  he  lived  in  that  land 
of  long-ago,  I  suppose  no  one  fully 
realized. 

I  remember  telling  him  one  day 
some  boyish  thing  told  me  by  his 
only  nephew,  "  Ed  " — Edmund  H. 
Eitel,  for  some  years  his  uncle's 


JAMES   WHITCOMB   RILEY 

secretary,  and  now  his  literary  ex 
ecutor  and  his  biographer.  The 
poet  was  listening  to  me — but  from 
far  away.  When  I  paused,  he  mur 
mured,  abstractedly: 

"Who  told  you?     'Hum'?" 

"  Hun\."  was  what  he  called  his 
younger  brother  Humboldt,  dead, 
then,  for  many  years. 

AndJ[  can  never  forget  the  pas 
sionate  intensity  he  expressed  of 
longing  for  hisjmother. 

"  She  has  been  dead,"  he  once 
said  to  me,  "  for  more  than  twenty 
years.  Yet  there  are  times  when 
I  want  her  so  it  seems  to  me  I  shall 
die." 

His  sisters  told  me  a  multitude 
of  stories  of  his  youth.  But  I  shall 
not  try  to  retell  them.  They  be 
long  to  the  "  Life  "  which  ^Edmund 
Eitel  is  writing  with  such  love  and 
care  and  understanding.  In  these 
modestly  offered  pages  I  am  keep- 
87 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

ing'strictly  to  my  own  recollections. 
All  over  the  country  there  are — 
there  must  be! — other  persons  with 
other  recollections,  and  other  rich 
hoards  of  his  letters.  To  every  one 
of  us,  it  may  be  that  he  showed  a 
different  phase  of  himself;  the  im 
pressions  of  one  may  even  seem 
to  contradict  those  of  others.  His 
was  such  infinite  variety!  And,  of 
course,  each  of  us  saw  him  through 
a  different  kind  of  lens,  according 
to  our  different  personalities.  It 
is  my  hope  that  never  may  I  seem 
to  say  "  Thus  he  was " — only, 
"  Thus  he  appeared  to  me." 


88 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 


IX 


readings  of  his 
own  works  were,  as  everybody 
knows,  in  very  great  demand 
throughout  the  country.  It  is  sur 
prising  how  much  of  that  sort  of 
thing  he  did;  because  he  disliked 
travel  and  he  heartily  disliked  being 
on  a  platform.  He  never  overcame 
his  stage  fright,  and  used  to  suffer 
acutely  from  it  —  quaking  nerves, 
stomach  affected,  and  other  rack 
ing  ills.  "  Getting  ready  for  the 
road,"  he  writes,  "and  gosh!  how 
I  dread  it!" 

"My  Favorite  Author,"  one  letter  be 
gins,  "  I  fear  will  not  get  as  worthy  a  letter 
as  deserved  this  time,  —  for,  to  save  the  soul 
o'  me,  I  can  find  no  gasp  of  time  from  the 
incessant  havoc  of  travel  and  breathless 
stress  of  having  to  catch  the  next  train 
89 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

for  some  place  else!  And  that  letter  of 
yours  was  such  a  good  one,  that  a  reply 
less  masterful  simply  isn't  fair  to  either  of 
us,  God  knows.  But  what  is  there  left 
a  fellow  between  trains — poised  on  the 
crossties  of  one  track,  wildly  trying  to 
catch  one  train  while  he  dodges  another, 
and  wishing  he  were  in  Chicago,  where  every 
one  walks — save,  doubtless,  the  walking 
delegate?  Both  at  Peoria  and  Galesburg 
your  friends  were  most  pleasantly  mani 
fest — so  strikingly  and  helpfully  so,  that 
at  both  points  of  our  combine  I  wanted 
them  right  along  through  the  rest  of  the 
tour  .  .  .  '  And  so  we  plough  along,'  as 
the  fly  said  to  the  ox." 

He  once  told  me  how  he  happened 
to  bring  into  his  repertory  that 
narrative  which  Mark  Twain  called 
the  supreme  example  of  American 
humor,  giving  it  as  evidence  in 
support  of  his  contention  that  the 
charm  of  American  humor  lies  not 
in  the  matter  but  in  the  manner. 
As  for  matter,  that  story  is  probably 
90 


JAMES  WHITCQMB  RILEY 

the  hoariest  "  chestnut "  in  the 
whole  category  of  time-honored 
jokes.  But  as  Riley  told  it,  it 
has  become  a  classic.  Briefly  the 
story  is  that  of  a  soldier  whose  leg 
was  shot  off.  He  entreated  a  com 
rade  to  carry  him  back  to  the  hos 
pital-tent;  the  comrade  complied 
and  was  carrying  him  pickaback, 
when  another  shell  whizzed  past 
carrying  off  the  wounded  man's 
head. 

The  comrade,  unaware  of  what 
had  happened,  was  halted  by  his 
Colonel.  *e  Where  are  you  going 
with  that  ?  "4  the  officer  demanded. 

"  To  the  hospital;  his  leg's  shot 
off." 

"  His  leg  ?  "  the  Colonel  thundered; 
"  his  head's  shot  off!" 

The  soldier  laid  his  burden  down 
and  looked  at  it  reproachfully.  "  He 
told  me  it  was  his  leg,"  he  explained 
to  the  Colonel. 

91 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

The  way  Mr.  Riley  came  to  use 
this  ancient  story  on  the  platform 
was  this:  He  and  Bill  Nye  were  on 
a  reading  tour  in  the  South.  The 
weather  was  oppressively  warm,  their 
engagements  were  many,  they  had. 
a  great  deal  of  travel  and  very  little 
rest,  and  neither  man  was  in  robust 
health.  All,  however,  would  have 
been  well  enough  had  it  not  been  for 
the  reception  committees.  On  the 
humorists'  arrival  in  each  town  they 
were  met  by  a  delegation  of  influen 
tial  citizens  chosen  with  reference 
to  their  local  repute  for  humor. 
Then,  instead  of  going  to  the  hotel 
where  the  weary  "  troopers  "  might 
rest,  "  low-necked  hacks  "  were  com 
mandeered  and  the  strangers  were 
driven  out  to  see  "  the  high  iron 
bridge,"  by  which  general  descrip 
tion  Mr.  Riley  was  wont  to  charac 
terize  the  average  small  city's  point 
of  interest.  All  the  way  to  the 
92 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

"  bridge  "  and  back  the  local  humor 
ists  regaled  their  guests  with  stories 
of  rare  old  vintages.  And  if  the 
guests  did  not  laugh  fit  to  kill  it 
was  plain  to  see  that  they  would  be 
put  down  as  having  swelled  heads. 
So  they  laughed,  though  it  did 
indeed  almost  kill  them,  until  one 
day  Mr.  Riley  struck.  He  was  hot, 
he  was  tired,  he  was  a-wearied  of 
high  iron  bridges,  and  go  a-riding 
in  that  inevitable  sea-going  hack  he 
would  not.  But  Mr.  Nye,  unable  to 
contemplate  the  local  humorists' 
dismay,  went  with  them.  The  after 
noon  wore  on  toward  six  o'clock 
before  he  returned. 

Mr.  Riley  had  written  a  lot  of 
letters,  rested  himself,  and  was  feel 
ing  so  fine  as  to  be  full  of  mischief. 
At  sight  of  Nye's  tired,  white  face 
Riley  was  moved  to  wickedness. 
He  tried  to  think  which  of  all  the 
hoary  tales  they  heard  in  every  town 
93 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

Nye  could  least  endure  to  hear  again. 
The  man  with  his  head  shot  off  stood 
out  prominent  in  the  record  of  their 
sufferings;  so  he  began  to  tell  it 
to  Nye,  faithfully  mimicking  the 
manner  of  those  local  humorists  who 
had  so  strange  a  genius  of  telling  a 
tale  wrong-side-before  that  what 
ever  pith  or  point  it  might  have  had 
was  undiscoverable.  The  way  Riley 
told  that  story  sent  Nye  into 
paroxysms  of  laughter,  and  it  was 
he  who  persuaded  the  astonished 
Riley  to  try  this  on  the  platform. 

He  never  told  it  twice  the  same. 
At  each  telling  he  seemed  to  have 
some  new  inspiration.  I  heard  it 
many,  many  times  and  came  as 
near  knowing  it  by  heart  as  one 
could  come  to  knowing  a  thing  of 
such  infinite  variety.  I  remember 
one  night  in  Indianapolis  when 
Mr.  Riley  was  reading  in  English's 
Theatre.  It  was  his  first  public 
94 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

appearance  in  his  home  town  in  a 
number  of  years,  and  he  had  given 
his  services  to  raise  money  for  a 
monument  to  General  Harrison. 
Indianapolis  was  greatly  excited  over 
the  event;  people  were  in  line  before 
the  ticket-window  as  early  as  two 
o'clock  in  the  morning — seven  hours 
before  the  sale  of  tickets  was  to  be 
gin.  Mr.  Riley  suffered  augmented 
agonies  from  stage-fright;  his  nerv 
ousness  caused  him  a  great  deal 
of  trouble  with  his  weak  heart,  and, 
among  other  ways  of  expressing  it 
self,  managed  to  bring  on  severe 
nose-bleeding.  To  know  something 
of  what  he  suffered  was  to  suffer  with 
him.  I  was  in  a  box  with  his  sisters, 
and  we  were  all  nervous.  When 
Mr.  Riley  came  to  the  story  of  the 
wounded  soldier,  of  which  by  that 
time  all  his  auditors  had  heard  so 
much,  we  followed  the  familiar  nar 
rative  point  by  point,  anxious  that 
95 


'REMINISCENCES  OF 

he  should  get  all  the  best  points  in. 
Alas,  one  of  the  funniest  touches  of 
all  he  left  out  entirely.  We  were 
so  sorry.  But,  listen!  What  was 
he  doing?  The  story  was  nearing 
its  end,  and  the  audience  was  con- 
vulsedjjwith  merriment.  When 
every  one  had  laughed  until  he 
cried,  until  his  sides  ached  with 
shaking,  until  he  felt  that  he  could 
laugh  no  more,  Mr.  Riley  went  back 
to  the  beginning  of  the  narrative 
and  told  it  all  over  again,  putting  in 
the  excruciatingly  funny  point  he 
had  missed  before.  And  on  the 
second  telling  his  audience  waxed 
hysterical. 

I  recall  this  incident  because  it 
is  so  illustrative  of  his  kind  of  humor, 
which  depended  not  at  all  on  the 
surprisingness  of  what  he  had  to  say, 
but  altogether  on  the  inimitable  way 
he  had  of  saying  it. 

One  never  tired  of  the  things  he 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

did.  So  far  from  feeling  satisfied 
because  you  had  once  heard  him 
recite  "  Good-by,  Jim!  Take  keer 
yerself,"  one  hearing  of  it  only  made 
you  the  more  eager  to  hear  it  again 
and  again.  You  might  know  the 
poem  by  heart;  you  might  have 
heard  him  recite  it  fifty  times; 
but  it  was  always  as  fresh  to  you  as 
the  morning  dew,  and  the  more 
you  had  had  of  it  the  more  you 
hungered  for. 

Mary  Riley  Payne,  the  younger 
of  the  poet's  sisters,  has  a  great  deal 
of  the_same  sort  of  whimsical  humor 
which  her  brother  Jim  had.  And 
it  was  Mary  who  expressed,  in 
comic  paraphrase  of  a  then  current 
coon-song,  an  opinion  which  may  be 
heretical  on  the  Isle  of  Man,  but 
is  strict  orthodoxy  in  many  other 
places.  Mr.  Riley  had  given  a  read 
ing  in  Tremont  Temple,  Boston,  to 
an  audience  which  jammed  that 
97 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

ample  auditorium  to  its  very  ridge 
pole.  Not  only  the  populace,  but 
all  the  Olympians  were  there.  Julia 
Ward  Howe  introduced  him,  and  it 
was  an  occasion,  even  for  Tremont 
Street.  On  the  same  evening,  Mr. 
Hall  Caine  read  in  Boston  to  an 
audience,  we  w^ere  told,  numbering 
less  than  a  score. 

"Oh,  well!"  Mary  said.  "What's 
wonderful  in  that?  There's  only 
one  of  Jim  in  all  the  world — and 
Hall  Caines  '  look  alike  to  me! '  " 


IOS 


From  the  Sargent  Portrait 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 


was  indeed  only  "  one  of 
Jim  in  all  the  world."  I  have 
heard  the  sentiment  expressed  in 
many  ways,  but  I  have  often  thought 
I  like  Mary's  way  best. 

I  want  to  tell  what  he  was  like 
as  I  saw  him  and  knew  him,  but  I 
find  myself  wondering  to  what  I 
may  compare  him  so  that  those 
who  never  saw  him  may  understand. 

His  portraits  tell  how  he  looked 
to  people  he  passed  or  people  he 
met  in  an  ordinary  way.  But  with 
what  similes  shall  one  tell  how  he 
looked  when  he  was  telling  Bud's 
bear  story  or  teasing  Hector  Fuller 
about  "  them  molasses/'  or  reading 
"  Bianca,"  or  reciting  the  veteran's 
tale  of  the  man  with  his  leg  shot  off, 
or  listening  from  out  the  far-away 
99 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

Child-World  when  he  asked:  "  Who 
told  you?  'Hum?'" 

There  was  only  one  of  him,  but 
that  one  was  so  various!  "How 
many  of  my  selves  are  dead?  "  he 
questions  in  one  of  his  poems.  But 
however  many  he  may  have  felt 
behind  him,  he  had  at  all  times 
enough  left  him  to  furnish  a  regiment 
of  ordinary  men  with  personality. 

I  hope  I  have  not  conveyed  the 
impression  that  the  moods  which  I 
have  quoted  were  ever-present  with 
him,  nor  even  that  they  were  his 
most  frequent  states  of  mind.  They 
would  have  been  far  less  'witching 
had  they  been  perpetual,  or  easy  ot 
access.  In  truth,  they  were  so  far 
from  evocable  at  will — either  his 
will  or  the  wish  of  others — that  they 
were  all  the  more  precious  when  the 
gods  of  the  soul's  winds  blew  favor 
ing  breaths. 

So  sensitive  a  creature  was  'prey 
100 


JAMES  WHITCCMB  RILEV 

to  ten  thousand  torments,  from 
within  and  from  without,  as  well  as 
attuned  to  ten'  thousand  delights. 

His  body,  as  completely  as  his 
spirit,  seemed  to  present  infinite 
"  exposed  nerve "  surfaces,  which 
shot  tingling  pain  through  him  when 
they  were  ever  so  lightly  brushed. 
He  was  often  irritable;  and  his 
irritability  had  a  tendency  to  aban 
don  the  sullen  defensive  and  be 
come  actively,  stingingly  mean. 
What  he  said  and  did  at  such  times 
caused  him  agonies  of  remorse  after 
wards.  I  can  never  forget  some  of 
the  things  he  said  to  me  about 
this  terrible  contrition  he  was  for 
ever  suffering.  It  was  one  of  the 
major  tragedies  of  his  temperament. 

He  was  so  sensitive  to  self-criti 
cism  that  I  think  he  had  less  sus 
ceptibility  than  the  average  to  criti 
cism  from  without. 

When    his    "  Rubdiyat    of    Doc' 
101 


"  •    'REMINISCENCES  OF 

Sifers  "  was  appearing  in  The  Cen 
tury.,  some  tender  paragrapher  in  a 
California  weekly  howled:  "That 
plague  of  bucolic  imbecility,  James 
Whitcomb  Riley,  has  broke  loose 
in  The  Century  again."  Something 
in  one  of  his  letters  made  me  think 
he  had  seen  this  and  been  hurt  by 
it.  I  ventured  upon  such  consola 
tion  as  my  twenty-year-old  bitter 
ness  with  the  crass  world  could 
muster.  I  daresay  he  was  much 
amused,  but  he  did  not  say  so. 

"This  is  no  letter  at  all,"  he  wrote, 
"  only  a  long-distance  clapping  of  hands 
over  your  lovely  *  Revelation  of  Christopher* 
[a  short  story,  just  published] — yes,  and 
the  fine,  strong,  heartening  letter  I'd  been 
silently  applauding  since  its  inspired  crea 
tion  on  the  19th;  for  even  a  full  day 
prior  to  its  arrival  the  spirit  of  it  smote 
me  like  a  sort  of  anonymous  glory.  Of 
course  I  shall  never  be  able  to  thank  you 
for  it — though  certain  I  am  that  you 
already  know  the  righteous  sense  of  my 
102 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

appreciation.  But  you  must  not  think 
it  is  'the  oft-recurring  gnat' — the  rabidly 
erudite  little  critic  you  so  recently  was 
afflicted  with — that  vexes  me  seriously 
at  all.  I'm  the  fellow  that  gets  after  me 
the  most  effectively  and  relentlessly.  Now, 
however,  I'm  at  peace  even  with  myself 
again,  and  no  end  of  good  things  are  com 
ing  my  way.  Wish  I  could  see  you  and 
talk  some  of  'em  over  at  you!/' 

Another  time  he  wrote: 

"  I  am  still  so  at  sea  under  such  stress 
of  weather;  my  mind  (such  as  it  is)  remains, 
as  then,  largely  chaotic.  Fact  is,  the  youth 
and  elasticity  is  gone  clean  out  of  it,  and  it 
now  seems  to  fit  the  demand  like  the  slack, 
limp  lasting  of  an  old  shoe.  Have  been 
trying  to  rest  it,  but  the  graceless  thing 
is  beyond  remedy,  I  really  believe.  In 
meantime,  how  flourishes  your  own  art- 
labors?  Can  you  yet,  as  Miss  Murfree 
said  to  me  jocosely  of  her  sister  ["  Charles 
Egbert  Craddock  "] — '  write  a  novel  with 
your  hat  on  and  a  parasol  under  your 
arm  '?  " 

How    shall    one    make    plain    to 
103 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

any  contented,  corn-fed  citizen  the 
super-tragedy  of  that  "  slack,  limp  " 
mind  and  the  feeling  that  "  youth 
and  elasticity  is  gone  clean  out  of 
it  "?  If  one  has  never  thrilled  to 
the  wonder- workings  of  such  a  mind, 
never  known  the  magic  which  evoked 

"  The  music  of  the  laughing  lip,  the  lustre 

of  the  eye; 

The  childish  faith  in  fairies  and  Alad 
din's  magic  ring — 

The  simple,  soul-reposing,  glad  belief  in 
everything. — 

When  life  was  like  a  story,  holding  neither 
sob  nor  sigh, 

In  the  golden,  olden  glory  of  the  days 
gone  by," 

how  shall  he  know  the  desolation  of 
having  forgot  the  "  Sesame  "?  Nor 
is  the  despair  of  each  lapse  less 
abysmal  because  in  that  tiny,  un- 
invaded  corner  of  the  mind's  king 
dom  where  a  remnant  of  memory 
is  still  regnant,  there  is  a  counsellor 
104 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

to  remind  one  that  on  other  occa 
sions  he  seemed  equally  conquered, 
yet  came  forth  in  triumph.  "  Ah, 
yes!  but  I  was  younger,  then. 
This  time  my  exile  is  for  all  eternity." 

If  it  was  disappointing  to  his 
family  and  friends  that  he  was 
unable,  at  times,  to  unlock  the 
gates  of  that  world  where  he  was  a 
fairy  Prince-Charming  —  youthful 
and  all-conquering — what  must  it 
not  have  been  to  him  to  stand  out- 
side5  an  old  man  in  a  beggar's 
cloak? 

If  ever  I  was  impatient  with  him 
on  that  account,  he  knows,  now, 
what  my  contrition  is — and  has 
forgiven  me. 

His  contrition  was  always  charm 
ing,  and  he  never  withheld  it. 

"  It    was    my    '  plumbing '    with    one 

phrase    of    [the   preface    of]    your    Golden 

Year  that  scarred  its  grammar.     You  had 

said    that    Mr.    Riley     (himself)     *  might 

105 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

say  "  waller  in  "  '  and  I  tried  to  correct 
the  inference  as  to  your  suggestion  that  my 
grammar  was  no  better  than  my  old 
farmer's.  So  it  seems,  after  all,  you  were 
right,  and  God  knows  the  pang  it  gives 
me  to  admit  it." 

His  sensitiveness  to  being  thought 
colloquial  by  restriction  and  not 
by  choice,  was  very  considerable. 
Whether  people  liked  or  did  not 
like  what  he  did,  he  wanted  them 
to  know  that  it  was  done  with 
painstaking  effort  by  a  man  who 
expressed  much  in  homely  or  child- 
simple  language  not  because  that 
was  his  only  speech,  but  because 
he  had  an  artist's  sense  of  the  way 
certain  ideas  should  be  set  forth. 
He  had  a  scholarly  knowledge  of 
verse  forms  and  a  facile  command 
of  them,  equalled  by  few  poets  of 
any  day.  He  used  words  with  the 
artistry  of  a  lapidary;  and  he  was 
as  much  at  ease  with  the  richest, 
106 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

most  sensuous  words  as  Swinburne, 
while  commanding  the  simplest  with 
a  mastery  like  that  of  Burns. 

When  my  first  novel  was  in  manu 
script,  he  read  it  with  painstaking 
particularity,  and  wrote  me  a  letter 
thousands  of  words  in  length,  con 
taining  his  comments  and  sugges 
tions  and  corrections.  I  remember 
discussing  some  of  these  with  Pro 
fessor  William  Lyon  Phelps,  of  Yale, 
who  was  much  interested  in  Mr. 
Riley's  attitude  toward  certain 
words.  Sometimes  one  could  share 
his  feeling  about  words,  and  again 
it  was  not  possible;  but  it  was  al 
ways  interesting  to  hear  how  words 
affected  him.  For  instance:  "  Don't 
use  trudge!  it  is  a  horrid,  patro 
nizing  word";  and  "countryside  is 
an  abomination,  weakly  smacking 
of  petty  poetry  ";  and  so  on.  Now, 
"  trudge  "  is  not  a  patronizing  word; 
but  he  had  an  aversion  from  it. 
107 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

And  there  is  no  equivalent  for 
"  countryside  "  in  certain  usages. 
But  he  was  as  sensitive  to  the  im 
pression  words  made  on  him  as 
the  master-musician  is  to  sounds. 

For  his  dialect  poetry  he  kept  note 
books  as  accurate  as  a  scientist's. 
Not  only  was  the  euphony  of  the 
dialectics  a  careful  study  with  him, 
but  he  knew  why  some  children, 
for  instance,  say  "  thist "  instead 
of  "  just,"  and  why  others  say 
"  ist."  There  was  nothing  hap 
hazard  in  any  of  his  work.  The 
philologist  of  the  future,  studying 
Middle-Western  colloquialisms  of  the 
late-nineteenth  century,  may  depend 
on  Riley's  transcription  of  them 
as  the  most  exact  ever  made. 

"  Yesterday,"  one  of  his  letters  begins, 
"  I  dined  merrily  with  the  sister  and  her 
Eitelian  family;  and  along  with  the  dessert 
came  Ed's  and  Elizabeth's  letters  from 
you.  Nor  could  the  exacting  literary  pep- 
108 


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JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

tics  of  the  epicurean  old-fool  uncle  find 
but  one  vaguest  savor  in  either  missive 
to  be  just  a  trifle  squeamish  over — i.e.: 
in  one  of  them  you  said  you  never  punned 
— yet  with  a  brazen  pun  both  before  and 
after  the  assertion.  And  then — all  to 
myself — I  sniffed  and  said,  '  Ho-ho ! '  And 
then — employing  the  same  discreet  voice — 
I  said  '  Ah-ha! '  as  one  belike  whose  slowly 
wakening  mind  '  beat  time  to  nothing  in 
his  head  from  some  odd  corner  of  the  brain.' 
And  then  ...  Of  course  the  folks  never 
knew  or  cared  about  some  hasty  note  I 
gravely  set  down  on  an  envelope;  but  it 
was: — 
In  jousts  of  old,  with  couchant  quill, 

A  poet  and  compiless  met — 

The  verse* t  of  punsters  ever  yet! 
And  punned,  and  laughed  just  fit  to  kill! — 
And — fact  is — she's  a  laughlin'  still!  " 

He  loved  to  play  with  words — 
as  when  he  said  he  had  gloated  over 
something  "  till  my  epigloatis  is 
'most  bust."  And  he  had  a  fancy 
for  such  incongruous  associations 
as  when  he  assured  me  that  another 
109 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

something    was    "  what    Theocritus 
would  call  '  a  peach/  3 

After  my  first  book  was  published 
he  wrote : 

"  For  a  long,  sad  while  I  was  afraid 
you  meant  to  shy  out  of  it  [authorship] 
and  be  lured  into  being  simply  the  pro 
ducer  of  the  ever-prone-to-fly-upward-and- 
wink-outward  scintillations  of  the  day  and 
hour.  Now,  you  see,  you're  a  'bedient 
child  of  the  gods;  and,  as  such,  they'll 
always  be  good  to  you — henceforward  ever 
more!  Nods  and  becks  and  wreathed 
smiles 

As  you  delight  'em 

Ad  infinitum." 

When"  his  Biography  began  to 
be  talked  of,  and  he  was  directing 
the  gathering  together  of  materials 
for  it,  I  was  asked  to  loan  his  letters 
to  me,  for  copying.  He  wrote: 

"  Thank  you  for  the  letters  my  Biographer 

wants.     He   has    astounded   me   with   his 

collection  of  like  matter  from  literary  friends 

in  all  corners  of  the  world,  it  would  seem 

110 


JAMES  WHITCOMB  RILEY 

...  As  to  your  own, — they  have  all  been 

preserved — most  of  them  in  one  place  of 

security,  though  some  few  elsewhere  adrift 

are  no  less  secure,  and  all  can  be  restored, 

if  desired,  for  your  Biography! 

A  notable  lady  of  letters  was  she, 

While  a  man  of  mere  note-able  letters  was 

he— 

So  found  the  unbiased  biographers 
Of  these  diverse-gifted  chirographers !  " 

I  am  sure  it  is  quite  unnecessary 
for  me  to  say  anything  about  the 
proportion  of  gallantry  to  strict 
truthfulness  in  all  the  pretty  play 
fulness  of  his  letters  to  me.  If  I 
could  have  shared  their  quaintness 
without  interpreting  their  allusions 
to  my  small,  unimportant  endeavors, 
I  would  naturally  have  preferred 
to  do  so.  But  as  this  was  to  be  in 
no  sense  a  biography,  but  only  an 
impression  of  Mr.  Kiley  as  it  was 
my  privilege  to  have  seen  and  known 
him,  I  hope  I  am  pardoned  the  per 
sonal  point  of  view.  In  that  "  Life  " 
111 


REMINISCENCES  OF 

which  Edmund  Eitel  is  writing,  we 
shall  see  Riley  from  a  hundred 
viewpoints,  and  know  how  infinite 
was  his  variety.  How  many  of 
his  phases  I  never  knew,  I  can  but 
vaguely  guess.  Those  in  which  he 
revealed  himself  to  me,  I  have  tried 
to  describe  so  that  others  might 
glimpse  something  of  his  ineffable 
charm. 

His  was  by  far  the  richest  per 
sonality  I  have  ever  known.  Ac 
quaintance  with  him  is  my  supreme 
consolation  for  what  would  other 
wise  have  been  the  irreparable  loss 
of  not  having  known  Charles  Lamb. 
As  it  is,  I  feel  that  not  only  have  I 
known  something  of  Riley,  but  that 
somehow,  through  knowing  him  I 
have  known  Lamb  too,  and  a  host 
of  other  immortals — if,  indeed,  there 
are  a  host  of  them! 
|  Because  he  was  playful  and  not 
didactic,  he  taught  me  many  things. 


JAMES   WHITCOMB   RILEY 

They  are  not  easy  to  enumerate, 
nor  even  to  define.  They  are  so 
inwoven  with  the  woof-threads  of 
my  mind's  pattern  that,  although  I 
can  distinguish  them,  and  hail  them 
gratefully,  I  can  scarcely  point  them 
out  to  others.  I  think  though  that 
I  can  with  strict  truthfulness  say 
there  is  never  a  day  when  I  am  not 
conscious  of  weaving  into  my  living 
some  color  that  he  taught  me  to 
appreciate  and  how  to  use.  His 
phrases,  his  melodies  are  part  of 
the  fabric  of  my  speech,  my  thought; 
the  cadences  of  his  voice  are  ever- 
present  in  my  ears.  So  also  it  must 
be,  I  feel  sure,  with  everyone  who 
knew  him.  He  was  one  of  those 
who  make  immortality  seem_  in 
disputable. 

Not  only  the  thousands  who  filed 
past  to  look  at  him  as  he  lay  sleep 
ing  beneath  the  dome  of  his  State's 
Capitol,   but   tens   of   hundreds   of 
113 


JAMES   WHITCOMB   RILEY 

thousands  of  others  throughout  the 
land,  murmured  their  good-byes  to 
him  in  words  of  his  own  verse.  He 
is  not  dead,  whose  song  lives  in  so 
many  hearts. 

"  I  cannot  say,  and  I  will  not  say 

That  he  is  dead. — He  is  just  away! 

With  a  cheery  smile  and  a  wave  of  the 

hand, 

He  has  wandered  into  an  unknown  land, 
And  left  us  dreaming  how  very  fair 
It  needs  must  be,  since  he  lingers  there." 


Printed  in  the  United  States  of  America 
114 


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IV  1 3  2002 


11  1933 


SEP    38  W34 
MAR   .13*935 


MAY    1    1948 

180ct'52DP 


LD  21-50m-l,'3; 


Reminisce  ices  of 
James  '."hiboomb  Riloy 


L5 


Jul 


MAY    11  1 


OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 


